Chapter Text
It’s late when Sam gets home—well past midnight and verging on three a.m. He’s been up since seven, but he still feels wide awake—almost wired. Might be the coffee he’s been mainlining for the past eight hours. Or maybe it’s the company he’s keeping these days.
Second year medical students don’t tend to keep the most normal hours. Neither do hunters, for that matter.
Dean and Bonham usually greet him at the door, but Dean was up even earlier than Sam this morning—out the door and down at the construction site before the sun tipped the horizon—and Bonham isn’t about to leave Dean’s side to come down and greet Sam on his own. Next time they get a dog, Sam’s going to make sure to give it as many table scraps as Dean; at least then he’ll have a shot at his fair share of affection.
Or maybe they could get another dog now—Dean’s been thinking about it; Sam can tell from his brother’s seemingly casual comments about the house feeling a little too empty and Bonham needing someone to play with.
It isn’t a bad idea, actually. Another dog might keep Bonham away from Sam’s textbooks and out of his sock drawer. Christmas is only a couple of months away. Maybe he should start asking around town, see if anyone’s dog has a litter about to drop. Frannie would probably know, and she’s actually damned good at keeping secrets for the short term, so he wouldn’t have to worry about his search getting back to Dean.
Grinning to himself, Sam hangs up his coat in the hall closet and then brushes a stray leaf from the mud caked on the bottom of his jeans—a memento picked up during field training at Bobby’s earlier tonight. He picks the leaf up immediately—Dean will give him hell if he comes down and finds it on the floor in the morning—and then starts for the kitchen. He can throw the unwanted passenger out and then fix himself an early morning snack before heading up to join his brother in bed.
Maybe he’ll wake Dean up for a couple of minutes of lazy kissing before they both settle in again. Dean will grump about it in the morning, but he never seems to mind during, and Sam’s going to have to kick Bonham off his side of the bed anyway. That particular task usually causes enough of a commotion to wake his brother even when Sam’s trying to be stealthy.
In the refrigerator, Sam finds a Tupperware container with his name scrawled across the top in Dean’s messy handwriting. Leftovers from Dean’s dinner with Erica last night. Sam opens the container and then makes a half-surprised, half-thoughtful noise as he regards the revealed food.
Dean never slouches when it comes to cooking, but Sam’s pretty sure that’s Peking Duck, which is Erica’s favorite. Also jasmine rice and a couple of homemade spring rolls. Dean only ever breaks out these recipes for special occasions—or when he wants a favor.
After a quick glance up at the ceiling in the direction of his sleeping brother, Sam shrugs the mystery aside and goes about heating up the food. He’ll just have to ask Dean what’s up tomorrow morning. Or maybe he’ll call Erica and get it straight from the horse’s mouth, so to speak. He has to set up their next study session anyway.
Thank God Erica enjoys quizzing him about obscure medical terminology. The one time he tried getting Dean to help, his brother spent half an hour making grossed out faces and fake retching noises at the illustrations in Sam’s textbook. Like he never stitched up worse on Dad.
Sam takes his time eating—mostly because he’s not ready to go to sleep yet, and if he gets Dean up when he’s this awake, he’s probably not going to be content with a few kisses. Dean isn’t going to complain about the blowjob tonight, but it always takes him forever to get back to sleep after he comes, so Sam will have to deal with his cranky, sulky attitude all day tomorrow.
As amazing as his brother is when he’s squirming underneath Sam’s hands and mouth, an overtired Dean is a something Sam would really rather avoid, thanks.
Finally, though, he can’t delay any longer, so he rinses his dishes off in the sink and loads them in the dishwasher. With one last glance around the kitchen to make sure he didn’t leave anything out on the counters, he shuts off the lights and heads back through the dining room toward the stairs. And then hesitates as he catches sight of his brother’s sleeping form stretched out on the couch.
As he stands in the doorway leading from the dining to the living room, part of the shadow on the couch lifts up as Bonham raises his head. There’s a muted thumping from the dog’s tail hitting the back of the couch, and then Bonham makes a low whine and begins shifting around excitedly.
“Shh,” Sam says, moving forward quickly. “Hey, boy, calm down, shh.”
But it’s too late. Dean’s already stirring and blinking his eyes open. He hauls himself up slightly—one hand on the back of the couch and the other trying to settle Bonham where the dog is moving around on his chest—and then grunts as Bonham finally uses Dean’s body as a springboard to launch himself to the floor.
“Sorry,” Sam apologizes, eyes on his brother as he crouches and scratches a hasty hello behind Bonham’s ears.
“Time’s it?” Dean mutters, pushing up onto his elbow and rubbing his face with the hand that was clinging to the back of the couch a moment before.
“Around three thirty. What’re you still doing down here, anyway?”
Letting out a yawn, Dean swings his legs off the side of the couch and sits up. “Waiting for you,” he answers, which makes Sam’s stomach coil tightly.
Dean only ever waits up for Sam when he’s on a hunt and Dean can’t come along, or when he’s had a bad day. And since Sam hasn’t been hunting in months ...
“You should have called,” he says, leaving Bonham where he is and going over to sit down next to his brother.
But Dean’s body posture is relaxed as he shakes his head. “’M fine,” he says. “Just didn’t think you’d take so long.”
“Sorry,” Sam apologizes again. “Bobby and Dad—” He stops, censoring himself too late as usual, and Dean sighs beside him.
“Bobby and Dad what?”
“We were talking about the camp, that’s all,” Sam answers, and then—mostly because Dean still looks half asleep and might be off guard enough to actually give a little ground this time, he adds, “We could really use your help, man.”
It isn’t a line. Dean’s always had a way with people and, after Dad, he’s the best hunter Sam knows. The fact that he’s retired—minus a couple of easy, weekend hunts that Sam’s been easing him into over the last year or so—doesn’t change that. And Dean has always had a mind for logistics—a way of thinking around corners that’s somehow both practical and creative at the same time.
Half of the issues that they’re grappling with would probably be solved in an hour if Sam could just get his brother to sit down at the same table as Dad.
Only problem is, Dean hasn’t been within ten miles of Bobby’s ever since their father moved in and started working on the task of turning the Salvage Yard into a hunter’s retreat and training camp. The most annoying thing is that it was really Dean’s idea—well, Dean’s and Andy’s. If there’s anywhere Dean can begin reconnecting with Dad, it’s on this project, but Dean is just as stubbornly resistant to the idea as ever.
It’s strange, having a decent working relationship with their father when Dean won’t talk to the man.
“Yeah, thanks but no thanks,” Dean grunts now. “One project at a time’s enough for me. You guys can handle Hogwarts on your own.”
“We’re not calling it that,” Sam says, needled both by the name and Dean’s continued obstinacy regarding Dad.
“Hey, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck,” Dean replies, and then leans forward and grabs a stack of papers off the coffee table. He’s more awake now, Sam can hear it in his brother’s voice—can see it in the crispness of his movements.
Their conversation about Dad and Hogw—the training camp—is clearly over, and Sam lets it go. He knows better than to push Dean too hard on either of those subjects.
“What’s this?” he asks instead, and then leafs through the documents his brother drops in his lap.
“Paperwork for the diner.” Dean leans back against the couch with a sigh and shuts his eyes before adding, “Paperwork’s your department.”
“You could figure out how to do these if you tried, you know,” Sam tells his brother, still glancing through the stack and wondering how he’s supposed to find time to wade through all of this red tape for Dean, run training exercises for Bobby and Dad, and study for the microbiology exam he has coming up next week.
Thank god the diner will be open (and hopefully running smoothly) by the time he has to seriously start studying for the USMLE.
“Eh,” Dean says, which is an off-handed refusal if Sam ever heard one.
“You’re lucky I’m addicted to your cooking,” Sam mutters, dropping the paperwork on the table. He’ll deal with it tomorrow.
“Yeah, cause that’s all you’re addicted to,” Dean says, shifting closer on the couch and giving Sam’s neck a playful bite.
And yeah, Sam’s suddenly not annoyed about having to fill out paperwork.
“You, uh. May have a few other redeeming qualities.”
Dean grins where his face is still pressed up against Sam’s throat. “A few, huh?” he asks, dropping his hand to Sam’s knee and running it up the inside of his thigh.
With a soft groan, Sam shifts his legs open further, giving his brother room to press the heel of his palm against his cock. The air in his lungs feels overheated as he tilts his head to the side, letting Dean mouth at his neck.
And then Dean pulls back, the blueballing son of a bitch.
“Oh my god, Dean, you did not just do that.”
Dean snickers to his left, and then the couch moves beneath Sam as his brother climbs into his lap and sinks down. Sam sucks in a sharp breath, hands fluttering briefly above Dean’s ass before settling on his brother’s hips.
Dean’s come a long way as far as sex goes—and from the amount of handjobs and blowjobs Sam’s been getting lately, his brother has actually rediscovered his hedonistic side—but there are still a few triggers they have to be careful of, and Sam going anywhere near Dean’s ass is one of them. They’re working on it together, slowly, but that’s a daylight activity. When they’re both wide-awake and sure of what they’re doing.
“Oh, I’m planning on following through,” Dean says, grinding down firmly enough to drive a grunt from Sam’s throat. “Just had something to tell you first.”
And Sam can’t take any more of that self-assured smirk on his brother’s face. He shifts his hold on Dean, putting his hands around his brother’s back and pulling him close. Gets his mouth on Dean’s throat and bites down briefly before sucking a bruise into the skin there—high enough that Dean’s going to have to endure catcalls from the guys when he goes in to oversee construction on the diner tomorrow.
This time, when Dean shudders in his arms, a low swear slipping past his lips, it’s Sam’s turn to chuckle.
“Tell me quick, dude,” he advises, blowing the words across the damp, sensitive patch of skin on his brother’s neck, “Cause you’ve got about ten seconds before I put you on your back and blow you.”
Dean squirms against him—hard to say whether it’s the warning or the way Sam immediately goes back to nipping at his throat—and then gasps out, “She said yes.”
Wait. What?
Sam makes himself pull back, dropping his head against the back of the couch so he can look up at his brother. Dean’s eyes are blown in the dim room—all pupil with only a thin line of iris—and fuck, but Sam just wants to get his brother naked and shuddering.
Except he’s missing something here. And the odd, fluttering sensation in his chest tells him it’s something big.
“Erica?” he checks, and Dean nods, moving in for Sam’s mouth.
Sam ducks his face away. “Dean, wait. Wait.”
“Christ, Sammy,” Dean grunts, but he settles a little—less like lightning in Sam’s arms and more like the low hum of static electricity. “And you call me a cockblock.”
“Erica said yes to what?” Sam asks, ignoring his brother’s complaint.
Dean scoffs, like he thinks Sam is joking, and then he takes another, closer look and his eyes widen. “You’re serious,” he says, and his face goes stiff and more than a little mortified. “Let go,” he says, pushing at Sam’s chest and trying to get up.
Aw, crap.
“Dean—hey, man, c’mon.”
“Let go, Sam!” Dean insists, and there’s enough strain in his voice that Sam does.
Dean gets up immediately, pacing from one end of the living room to the other. He isn’t wearing his cuffs—usually doesn’t when he’s home, these days—and normally Sam would be happy about that, but Dean also has a nervous habit of rubbing his thumb over the scars on his left wrist, which is too close to his old habit of worrying at the scar on his temple for comfort. He’s rubbing the inside of his wrist now, clearly agitated, and Sam pushes forward to the edge of the couch, desire forgotten.
“Dean, what’s wrong?” he demands.
“I thought—we talked about this, Sam. I thought you were on board.”
“I’m not not on board,” Sam points out. “But it’d help if I knew what we were talking about.”
Dean just shoots him a glance—two parts pissed off and one part unhappy—and keeps pacing. Which means Sam gets to piece this one together on his own. Great.
He runs a hand through his hair and thinks back over the last few weeks, tries to locate any conversations he might only have caught half of. The only thing he can come up with is Dean’s repeated hinting that he wants another dog, and there’s no way that would be serious enough for this kind of reaction, and anyway, they wouldn’t need Erica to—
“Oh my god,” Sam breathes as it hits him. “You asked Erica to have a baby.”
The look Dean gives him at that isn’t anything but scathing. “Welcome to the conversation, Doctor.”
Still mostly numb with the shock of realization, Sam says, “You don’t want another dog. You want a kid.”
Their kid. As in, his and Dean’s.
Dean has stopped pacing now, looking at Sam through narrowed eyes. After a few seconds, his hands fall to his side. “You really thought I was talking about getting a dog, didn’t you?” he says.
“I was gonna ask Frannie to find a puppy,” Sam admits, and then leans forward and puts his head in his hands. “Fuck, Dean. You couldn’t have just asked?”
“I did ask!” Dean shouts, and when Sam glances up his brother’s jaw is squared belligerently. “Not my fault you weren’t paying attention!”
Sam’s about to point out that most couples have this sort of conversation in plain English instead of speaking in code, when something occurs to him. “She said yes?” he checks.
“Does it fucking matter, Sam?” Dean snaps. “I mean, clearly you don’t think we should—”
“Dean,” Sam says, sharply enough to shut his brother up.
Dean does close his mouth, but he’s still breathing hard and his eyes are flashing as Sam pushes to his feet and moves closer.
“She said yes,” Sam says again—a statement this time. “Yours or mine? No, stupid question. Did you make a deposit at the sperm bank yet?”
Dean squirms, embarrassment leaking through his anger. “That’s a little personal, Sam.”
“Did you?”
Dean’s mouth works for a moment and then, sourly, he answers, “No.”
“Why not?” Because Dean isn’t the type to move forward on something like this until he has all the pieces in place.
Dean looks at him mulishly and doesn’t answer, which means he’s embarrassed by whatever the answer is. And there’s only one surefire way to get Dean to talk when he’s behaving like this.
Sam expects to have his hand slapped away the first time he reaches for Dean, and his brother doesn’t disappoint him. Dean slaps at him the second time too. The third time, though, he lets Sam catch his wrist—rough pattern of scar tissue beneath his fingertips—and reel him in. He’s unyielding in Sam’s arms—tense and still angry—but Sam ignores that and starts kissing the side of his brother’s throat. He keeps his touch gentle this time, and soft, and after a few minutes the tension in Dean’s muscles eases.
“Why not, Dean?” Sam asks again, kissing his way up to his brother’s jaw and running his fingertips up and down Dean’s back and arms.
“Wanted,” Dean rasps, and then grips Sam’s bicep in a firm grab. “Wanted it to be you getting me off.”
It’s ... probably the most romantic thing Dean’s ever said to him.
Sam’s chest expands in a painful rush and he pulls Dean more firmly against his chest. “You got a specimen cup somewhere?”
“B-bed.”
“Okay, then,” Sam whispers, and kisses his brother’s scarred temple.
Dean jerks slightly in his arms—Sam usually tends to avoid that spot—and then stiffens for a different reason. “What?”
“In case you missed it,” Sam says, keeping his voice light and teasing as he draws his brother back toward the stairs. “This is me saying yes.”