This was actually two paragraphs I had left over from a drabble I did last year, post Home…they sat on my hard drive all this time until I started up with Not NaNoWriMo and have been just waiting for me to look at them again.The number of tiny 2 and 3 paragraph files I have is kind of scary. Maybe I should start a challenge… (New word count: 1015)
NC17, Dean/Sam… post Home schmoop.
I Left My Heart in Topeka
by maygra+++++
The ticket Missouri gave Dean can be cashed at any lottery outlet. At five hundred dollars it is right at the limit that doesn't require them to submit it to the state lottery office.
In Topeka, they rent a hotel room that doesn't reek with age or afternoon sex and Sam runs the shower as hot as he can stand. When the steam clouds the mirror he gets in. When Dean climbs in with him Sam finally relaxes.
Sam's back is one mass of bruises. Dean checks each rib, surprised none are broken given that Sam got tossed around the kitchen of Jenny's house like a rubber ball. Two of them on the left side are tellingly sore though.
The soap won't wash off the bruises but Dean's touch eases them anyway.
When Dean turns him around and catches his face between his hands, his kiss makes Sam forget all about them.
The towels are thick and fluffy, and the sheets are clean and smell of bleach and fabric softener.
Dean tells himself that his mother's ghost may have been powerful but not omniscient as he presses Sam to the bed and pushes his body into this brother's. Sam realizes he never knew how much Dean looked like her and the fact that he needs and wants Dean more now than he ever did her makes him feel guilty. He wonders if Dean feels the same way.
They are silent through it all except for the sounds they can't help but let escape, recognizing their mother is between them now, the way their father used to be. Eventually, her presence won't make any difference, just as John's doesn't.
Neither John nor Mary are here. In their own way, they've each left their sons alone, however unwillingly, and left them with only each other.
Their approval never sank as deeply as their disapproval, and Dean knows his father wouldn't even try to understand this.
Sam knows it too, but like everything else about him he thinks his father disapproves of, he reminds himself that this was never about what John wanted or needed.
Sam never fit in at college because he was missing part of himself. Never telling Jessica about his life had at least as much to with this as it did with the demons and monsters he grew up hunting.
Jessica deserved his honesty as much as Dean ever did and he feels as guilty for that as for her death.
But Sam doesn’t feel guilty for this, when Dean is buried as deeply in his body as his brother is wedged in his heart and soul, it makes no sense to feel guilty for something he needs as much as the air he breathes.
Dean presses deeper and harder, supporting Sam's leg so his brother can open wider for him and not have to work so hard to find pleasure in this. And he knows when Sam is past pain and past effort because his head goes back and his hips lift to meet every thrust, in sync here as they are so rarely in sync out there.
Sam feels Dean come before he sees it register on his face, the slick feel of his dick holding Sam wide and still until Sam squeezes his own dick and follows his brother over the edge of what they both can stand and neither will deny.
When Dean tries to pull back, to ease off him and save Sam any more bruises, Sam pulls him back down and locks arms and legs around him until Dean stops resisting and gives in. When his dick slips free of Sam's body, Sam has to bite back on the sound he knows is too close to a whimper to let it escape. If he does, Dean will kiss him but he'll also call him a girl, and Sam wants the kiss but can't bear the other because it only reminds him of the differences between them and he's not ready for that to become so obvious again.
Dean watches Sam swallow and close his eyes and it's right on the tip of his tongue, to tease Sam about this, when it's just sex -- except the taunt dies before it's formed. This isn't just sex and it never has been, never could be. Sex he can get just about anywhere and anytime, and Sam's never tried to stop him from getting what he needs. Or even from getting what he wants.
And maybe that's the real difference between them -- because Dean has always been more than willing to make sure Sam gets what he needs, but he's not nearly as sure to give Sam what he wants. Mostly because sometimes what Sam wants is so directly at odds with what Dean wants he can't reconcile the two.
Dean shifts just enough so that all his weight isn't pressing Sam down into the bed, but never lets go of him. When Sam finally opens his eyes, Dean doesn't smirk or make fun of him, all he does is press his palm to the center of Sam's chest, and dip his head to take Sam's mouth like he's offering something. Sam tangles his finger in the cord and charm around Dean's throat and twists it -- not enough to cause discomfort but enough that Dean can't pull back easily.
Dean settles against him and Sam closes his eyes again, feeling fatigue and deep aches pull him down. Dean's thumb on his chest, rubs a warm spot into his flesh and he lets sleep come.
When Sam is really asleep, Dean carefully pulls his fingers from the cord and then threads his fingers through Sam's. Tomorrow they will head out of Kansas again, and Dean really hopes they never have a reason to return. Seeing his mother was something he'd never hoped for, never dreamed of -- and that she recognized him after so many years and through so many changes just reassures him that he's still her son. She'd always been his mother but he's hasn't been as sure about the other.
He'd only had the memory of her until returning to Lawrence, and he can take that with him again when he leaves a second time.
Dean's half asleep before he realizes that whatever he lost here, he didn't lose Sam. Not the first time and not the second.
And Sam is better than a memory.
Losing his mother was reason enough to leave, reason enough to stay away.
Sam is reason enough to keep going.
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(1015 new words, 1093 total)