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They spent a day in Pittsburgh licking their wounds, phoning every hunter they knew for info on Bela’s whereabouts. Nobody could tell them a damn thing. There was a psychic down in El Paso who Bobby claimed, with a shrug, may know something—a good tracker, he said. They had no cases, no clues, and no cash, so they packed their bags and headed south.
It took twenty-seven hours to get from Pittsburgh to El Paso. They drove without stopping, taking turns behind the wheel. The sooner they got to El Paso, the sooner they could get to Bela, and the better chance they had of finding the Colt.
They hit traffic in Indianapolis, and then again in St. Louis.
“Tell me again why we’re doing this,” Dean said, when they had been stopped for more than half an hour.
“To get to Bela and the Colt,” Sam said dryly. “Your words.”
“Yeah, well, sometimes a man lives to eat his words, Sam.”
Traffic inched forward again, then stopped. Dean slumped against the wheel, despairing.
“Colt’s probably halfway to China by now, anyway.”
“We don’t know that. Look, if you’re Bela, wouldn’t you want to maximize the sale, take some time finding the right buyer?”
“Sure,” Dean said, tightly, “because Bela is such a good and upstanding citizen, who cares so much about finding ‘the right buyer.’”
He didn’t say the obvious, which was that Bela probably already had a buyer lined up back when she’d stolen the damn thing. He was pretty sure Sam already knew and was just trying to be reassuring, the same way he’d been since the night of Dean’s choked-out confession back in Pittsburgh. Hearing Dean say out loud that he didn’t want to die had, if not given him new confidence, then at least renewed some of his flagging determination, and there was a squareness to his shoulders, a firm set to his jaw and brow that had been missing for some weeks.
It made Dean feel worse, somehow. It wasn’t that he didn’t believe in Sam; he believed in Sam as much as he could believe in anything. But there was always that voice in his head calling out, Keep expectations low! He just didn’t see the point in getting his hopes up—not about the Colt, and certainly not about the other thing. Hell. The mangled-up, twisted thing he was going to become. Sam spread the map out across the dash, said, Okay, we’re almost there, just turn here, and Dean just rolled the window down, stared out at the desert and breathed it in, the smell of wood-smoke and iron and burning sage.
Bobby’s psychic friend lived in a blue house by the railroad tracks, so close to the border you could hear the street vendors calling out in Spanish from over the fence. Her name was Luisa. She was middle-aged, with long dark hair, hoop earrings, and a permanent arch in her brow that reminded him immediately of Ellen. She flinched at the sight of him. That was the problem with psychics; they were always all up in your business before you’d even had the chance to say hello. But she didn’t say a word about—his circumstances. The deal. Didn’t ask about where he was going or where he’d been, just led them into the living room, brought out three Cokes in glass bottles from the fridge, and asked if this was their first time in El Paso.
Luisa had lived in this house her entire life, and when she wasn’t taking Bobby’s calls, she apparently spent a lot of time being a nuisance to city government. Every inch of the place was littered with signs and brochures attesting to her active role in the neighborhood association, her firm opinions on various local causes. She was eager to know if they had been to the plaza yet, or to any of the state parks, and then to fill them in on who was gentrifying where, and what was to be done about this and that. Dean let Sam handle most of the conversation, tired and irritable from the long drive and ready to be done with it, the whole day.
He practiced casing the joint to stay awake, as was his habit. On the wall across from the couch, hanging above the TV, was a shelf crowded with Elvis figurines in every shape, size, and costume: Elvis in a white jumpsuit; Elvis in a gold tuxedo; Elvis in a Hawaiian shirt and lei, strumming a clay ukulele.
“You a big fan of the King?” he asked, gesturing at the shelf. Beside him, Sam wrinkled his nose; Dean was interrupting what had become, to his increasing horror, a rather spirited discussion of municipal zoning.
Luisa beamed. “You boys like Elvis?”
Dean straightened his shoulders. “Yes, ma’am. Elvis, Hank Williams, Little Richard. Our dad raised us on the classics.” He nudged Sam with one elbow. “Sam’s a big fan too, aren’t ya, Sammy?”
Sam glared at him. “Sure am,” he said, smiling through gritted teeth.
“Kid’s real shy, but I’m telling you, he does a spectacular Hound Dog.”
“Good man,” Luisa said, grinning. “My mama loved Elvis. She used to clean house for this lady in Silver Springs, and every year, at Christmas, we’d get another one of those figurines.”
She looked away, her smile softening.
“I always wanted to take her to Graceland before she died. But there was just never enough time. Or enough money.”
Dean swallowed. “Sorry to hear that,” he said, and meant it.
Luisa shrugged him off. “Yes, well. That’s life, isn’t it?” She smiled thinly. “And in the end, she died a very happy woman. So I’m grateful.
“Now,” she said, clapping her hands together, “I hear you boys have a girl to catch.”
She asked if they had anything with them that Bela had touched. Sam brought out the empty jar of African Dream Root, and Luisa spent a few minutes turning it over in her hands. She led them to her kitchen, where there was an honest-to-God crystal ball surrounded by newspapers and carnations and laminated green tablecloth. Dean kicked Sam under the table, grinning. Sam shot him a pointed look, but Dean knew they were both thinking the same thing. It was awfully cliché.
Luisa spent a long time staring into her crystal ball, stroking it, doing whatever it was that psychics did. The clocked ticked. They sat around the table for what felt like hours, sipping their Cokes and eating homemade tamales, watching Luisa alternate between a spirit board and a deck of cards. Every few minutes, she’d pull out a card and go hmm, or else her hand would start to wobble on the planchette, and all three of them would lean forward in their chairs. Then she’d frown, rub at her temples, and they’d all slump back again in unison.
It went on like that until just before sunset. Luisa hung her head, her hands clasped awkwardly together. “There’s powerful magic surrounding that girl,” she said. “I don’t think I can help you boys.”
Dean bit down on the inside of his cheek, hard. His cheeks burned. His fists tightened. He felt betrayed and vaguely humiliated, like a child caught believing in Santa Claus. It was stupid. He’d had no reason to expect anything from her, not really. And besides, it was just the Colt. It wasn’t like that would be enough to save him. Hell, even when they had it, he hadn’t thought...
“Great,” he said, through clenched teeth. "Just great."
Beside him, Sam had gone completely stone-faced. “Dean,” he said, sounding weary. There was a shadow across his brow, a muscle working quietly in his jaw. The slow turning of a gear. Dean felt a strong urge to put his thumb to it. Press it smooth.
Luisa didn’t seem offended. She just looked sad for him. She hugged him goodbye outside, in front of a huge brick church with an enormous mural of a saint, while the sun dipped low behind the mountains, turning them pink. “I’m so sorry, baby,” she whispered, and he knew she didn’t mean about Bela or the Colt. His whole body sagged against her, and he closed his eyes, tired in every pore. It wasn’t her fault. It was just the life. Sometimes you drove thirty hours, the FBI and a demon bitch from Hell both hot on your tail, and all you got for your trouble was a plate of hot tamales. It wasn’t the worst deal in the world, all things considered. You learned to take your lumps.
**
“So, that was a bust,” Dean said, hitting the bed with a thunk. He pressed his face into the pillow. It was scratchy and smelled like cigarettes.
“I’ll talk to Bobby in the morning, see if he has any more leads, and if not I’m thinking we take a bit of a siesta—maybe hit the bar, check out the casino.”
Nothing from the other bed. “Hey,” Dean said, propping himself up on one elbow.
Sam was reading something on his laptop. He had the look of a man doing difficult math in the back of his head, focused and remote. And there was that muscle in his jaw again. Ticking.
“Hey,” Dean said again, “hey, earth to Sam.”
“What?”
“I was thinking tomorrow, we take a breather. Talk to Bobby, try to rustle up some cash.” He frowned. “Hey, you okay, man?”
“Yeah,” Sam said. “Just tired.” He shut his laptop and got up to turn off the light.
Dean lay awake for a while after that, listening to the sounds of the overpass. Four beers and a plate of enchiladas had done nothing to drive away the long day and all its disappointments. His mind cycled through the usual litany of concerns: Bela and the Colt. Sam. Ruby. Lilith. Hell. Sam.
Sam, he was sure, would be fine. He would hurt for a while, yeah, but he would be fine. Sam was like that—strong and resilient where Dean knew himself to be needy and wanting. However bad it seemed, his obsession with saving Dean would eventually pass. But Dean was beginning to see that he would be vulnerable, after. He would need someone to watch his back.
If only they had the Colt—then what? Nothing, he thought. Nothing at all.
He shifted onto his side, so he could see Sam.
In the dark, Sam’s face was unreadable and very still. Shadows pooled beneath his eyelashes. The moon came in through the window, catching on the sharp tip of his nose, the high points of his cheeks. The gentle rise and fall of his chest in the dark. Dean let out a long-held breath. It was impossible to tell, from here, whether Sam was asleep or awake.
“Hey Sam,” he whispered.
There came a shifting sound from the other bed.
“Yeah?” Sam didn’t sound like he had been sleeping.
“Do you remember that first time we stayed in Texas, when you were six? Dad found us those cowboy hats at Goodwill, and you thought everyone in Texas wore cowboy hats all the time, so…”
“So I wore it to school on my first day, and everyone thought I was a freak. Yeah, of course I remember. And I only thought that because that’s what you told me.”
Dean grinned. It really was a good memory.
“Dean, it’s two in the morning.”
“Listen, uh. I know you pretty well, you know? Like, pretty much everything about you.”
Sam snorted. “I mean, I wouldn’t say everything about me. But yeah, I guess,” he said. “What’s this about?”
Dean laughed weakly. His fingers twisted in the sheets. “Right, well. I was just thinking, if I ever come back…”
Sam was sitting straight in bed now. “Dean,” he warned.
“Yeah,” Dean said. “Yeah, I know, it’s just. If it happens, if I ever—come back, I might say some things to you, things to get inside your head. So you gotta promise me, whatever I say, that you won’t—you gotta be safe.”
“Dean,” Sam said, shaking his head. “Dean, it isn’t going to happen.”
Dean closed his eyes. He blew out an unsteady breath. “Yeah, you’re right. Sorry, Sammy.”
He listened as the sound of Sam’s breathing filled the room. Then there was a hand on his shoulder, an arm flung across his chest. Sam’s nose nudged gently at the base of Dean’s scalp. His hair, where it fell across Dean’s temple, was still wet from the shower.
“C’mon, man,” he whispered, his breath hot on Dean’s neck. “Just go to sleep.”
Dean's heart hammered uneasily in his chest. They were too old to do this, he reminded himself, and felt Sam's arm tighten across his chest, his leg wrapping around Dean's thigh. Without thinking, Dean shifted closer. Fuck it, he thought, too tired to remember what it was he was telling himself to fuck, and fell asleep to Sam's thumb stroking over his hip, breath gusting over Dean's ear, while outside the wind blew hot and dry.
**
Dean woke feeling oddly lightheaded, blood humming beneath his skin. They had moved around a bit in the night; now Sam’s face was buried in his chest, and he was drooling, the same way he did when he was just a kid. Carefully, Dean extricated himself from Sam’s limbs, went to the bathroom and splashed some water on his face. When he came back, Sam was still conked out. His cheek, where it had been pressed into the sheets, had creases in it. Dean tried to picture him old, at the end of a long, happy life, with wrinkles and thinning hair and bifocals and maybe a walking stick—and that, that right there, that was the thing that would make it all worth it. Dean just wouldn’t be there to see it.
After breakfast, Dean suggested they pay a visit to the casino. But Sam shook his head, said, “Actually, I was thinking of checking out the library,” and there was that steely look in his eye again, the one that said that he was back on the research wagon, that he hadn’t given up on the mission to rescue Dean.
There was no point in arguing, so Dean just pasted on a smile, nodded, and said, “That’s cool, man,” even though it really wasn’t. He had less than four months left, and if he couldn’t spend them with Sam, cleansing the world of every evil thing, then he wanted to spend them with Sam, doing tequila shots and watching Sam lick chili con queso from his fingers. But the thought of spending all day in a dusty library, watching Sam go through book after book, trying and failing to save him—yeah, no. Sam could knock himself out; Dean didn’t need to stick around to watch.
He spent the day wandering alone through Segundo Barrio, mostly looking at the murals, taking crappy pictures on his cellphone. He had never been much for God or organized religion, but he thought he might have gone to church more if it had been anything like in those murals, with priests on bikes and angels with wings the colors of the Mexican flag.
He wondered if it would be weird to get Sam a rosary—or, if not a rosary, then some other thing he might wear for protection, after. Something nicer than one of Bobby’s dinky little amulets, but not too girly either. He shook off the thought. Yeah, definitely weird. And besides, that was what the tattoos were for.
He walked all the way out to the edge of town, as far out as he could go, far enough that he could practically see across the border into Mexico. He couldn’t, though, because of the highway. Instead, he just stood there for a while, watching the cars go by and breathing through his nose, the rotten-egg smell of sewage from the Rio Grande.
He wondered if Sam would give him a hunter’s funeral. He’d never heard of a demon taking possession of its own meat-suit before, but it couldn’t hurt to be safe. He hoped Sam would choose somewhere like this for the pyre—anonymous, with lots of cars.
By then it was after 6, and no longer too early to go sit in a bar somewhere. So he turned around and headed back toward San Jacinto Plaza, where he found the dive-iest dive bar he could and proceeded to order the first of what would hopefully be many beers. The whole day had sucked, and he was in the mood for a fight or a fuck, anything to get himself a win.
He got a text from Sam sometime around his fourth beer. Back at the motel. Where are you? Dean texted him the name of the bar, then turned his attention to the room. It was nearly 8 o’clock then, and the place was finally starting to fill up with adventurous co-eds and soldiers from Fort Bliss. There was a whole group of them over by the pool table—macho-looking guys in fatigues, already half-drunk, who blustered and swore too loudly, and who Dean knew from experience usually went down hard after the first round of pool.
He watched them a while from the barstool, waiting for an in, before he realized one of them was watching back. Big fucking guy, standing a little to the left of his friends, his eyes flickering to Dean and skittering away again, unsure. Young, with dark hair and muscles that rippled beneath his tan military t-shirt. The next time it happened, Dean held his gaze and, feeling bold, gave him an immediate and obvious once-over. The kid startled a bit, then rearranged himself. This time, when his eyes met Dean’s, they were dark and gleaming.
“I’m gonna go take a leak,” the kid told his friends, loud enough for Dean to hear him over the din of the bar.
Dean waited the obligatory thirty seconds before sliding off the barstool and heading in the direction of the men’s room.
Up close, the kid looked like he’d just left basic training, with round, scuffed cheeks, a trail of acne along his jaw, and more patchy stubble than Dean thought military regulations would allow. But his hands were hot and terrifyingly huge and more or less exactly what Dean had been craving. One of them slid under his t-shirt, pinning him to the inside of the stall. Dean could feel him grinding up against him through their clothes, and—God, fuck yeah, he was huge there, too. Huge and happy and a lot more eager than Dean would have expected from that first awkward glance inside the bar. Only, he must still have had some sense left, because when Dean reached for him through his camo, he shivered and shook his head. “Not here,” he said, and led them both into the alley.
It was cold outside, and Dean spent probably more time than was strictly wise rubbing up against the kid, as much for warmth as for pleasure. He was tugging at the kid’s zipper, slowly sinking to his knees, when he felt the kid freeze underneath him. He was staring, stricken, at something just over Dean’s shoulder.
Dean turned, and there it was: one of the soldiers from inside the bar, staggering out with his cigarette and lighter.
The guy was red-faced and clearly drunk. He stared, glassy-eyed, from the kid, to Dean, to Dean’s hand on the kid’s zipper. His brow scrunched together in confusion.
“Yo, Martinez. Is this guy bothering you?”
The kid—Martinez—had gone pale. He opened his mouth, once. Closed it.
Slowly, Dean stood up, brushing the dirt from his knees.
“We’re good here,” he said, holding his palms up for the guy to see. “Just a little misunderstanding between me and, uh—Martinez.”
The guy lurched forward. He pushed at Dean’s shoulders, knocking him all the way back against the wall.
“I dunno,” he said. His breath was sour on Dean’s face. “Sure looked like you were giving my boy a hard time.” He swung unsteadily at Dean’s head. Dean rolled to one side, and the guy hit brick. He howled, cradling his injured hand.
“Fucking hell,” he moaned, and swung at Dean again. Dean dodged, easily.
“Come on, man,” he said, snickering. The guy looked like one of those inflatable tube men, listing uselessly from side to side. “Is that the best you’ve got?”
The guy roared. By then, Martinez had snapped out of his trance and was trying to pull him off. But it was too late; the noise had attracted a whole gaggle of army guys from the bar. They came pouring out the door, one by one, and the fight soon multiplied into one against two, three, four, five.
Dean ducked, dodged, and dropped. He rolled against the wall, elbows knocking against the brick. His knees scraped the asphalt. His cheek split. He was kicking at one of the guys, trying hard not to get thrown into a dumpster, when someone grabbed him by the forearm and pulled him out into the street.
It was Sam. “Come on,” he yelled, tugging at Dean’s wrist. Which is when Dean heard them. The police sirens.
Sam dragged him into the passenger seat of the Impala, and they were off—Sam was taking them down Main Street, past the Spanish neocolonial buildings and the parking garage, over the bridge and onto I-10. They drove until they couldn’t hear the cop cars, and then they kept driving, past the Cinemark and the Walmart and the car dealerships—all the way out, until the speed limit slowed them to a crawl and there were no more buildings, just mountains and desert and sky.
Sam didn’t look at him the entire ride, just stared straight out at the road, his hands tight on the wheel, his jaw tighter. When they came, at last, to a dirt access road, he stopped, got out, and stood bent over the car, his hands balled up into fists on the hood.
Dean approached him slowly, palms held up.
“Sam,” he said.
Sam whirled around, rising up to his full height. His chest heaved up and down.
“You know what, Dean? I don’t get you,” he spat. “You tell me you don’t want to die. Fine. And then I find you—what, picking fights in bars?”
Dean looked at the ground. “That’s not true.”
“Really? ‘Cause that's sure as hell how it looked.”
Dean thought about how to explain. The bar. The smell of the border. Martinez. The drunk guy. The words died in his throat.
All he could think to say was, “It didn’t start that way.”
Sam’s nostrils flared. “Then tell me, Dean. How did it start?” He was standing flush against Dean’s chest now, crowding him up against the hood of the Impala.
“Just—tell me,” Sam said, a little choked. His head drooped. “Please, man. I thought we were past this.”
Dean opened his mouth to speak. The cold metal of the hood dug into his back, making it impossible to think. He tried to concentrate on Sam. Sam’s eyes were huge and shiny. His breath came in quick pants, tickling the hairs on Dean's face. There was that muscle working in his jaw again, and—God, but Dean wanted to reach out and touch it.
Fear and arousal mingled together and raced down his spine in tandem. And there it was, that familiar rush of heat to his dick. He was hard, he realized. Fully hard and throbbing in his jeans. His heart raced. He squeezed his eyes shut and prayed, to a God he didn’t think he believed in, that Sam wouldn’t look down.
Sam came closer. They were standing thigh to thigh now, hip to hip.
“Dean,” Sam said, a question in his voice. And then: “Dean,” he said again, breath stuttering across Dean’s throat. Dean knew it for sure then: Sam, the stupid fucker, had looked down.
“Shut up,” he said, and felt plausible deniability go right out the window. He tried to bolt, but Sam grabbed him by the wrist and held him.
“Dean,” he said, “Dean, it’s alright.”
Dean cracked an eye open. Sam’s whole face had changed; he was still wide-eyed and flushed, but now there was something soft and wondering in him. He held Dean’s gaze for one long moment. His mouth opened and closed, like a fish.
Slowly, very slowly, he let go of Dean’s wrist and brought his hand up to brush hesitantly along Dean’s jaw. It was trembling, Dean realized. Sam’s hand was actually trembling.
“Stop me if this isn’t okay,” he said, and tipped Dean’s head back so he could close the distance.
They kissed for—Dean didn’t know how long. A long time. Sam tasted like queso and refried beans. He bent Dean all the way back against the hood, biting at his lip, licking into his mouth, bruising, his nose bumping against Dean’s cheek, and now Dean’s heart wasn’t just racing, it was jumping, skipping, leaping from tall buildings and dancing a happy jig through the streets.
This is what it’s like, he thought. This is what it’s like to be kissing Sam. His brother.
He had thought about it before. Of course he had. But most of the time he spent thinking about it was actually spent sternly reminding himself not to think about it. He hadn’t really gotten this far before—hadn’t really thought about what it would be like to have Sam holding him down; Sam slipping a hot, heavy hand beneath his t-shirt; Sam undoing the zipper of his jeans and reaching for him between his legs, thumbing at the head of his dick, getting him wet.
He could feel Sam rubbing against his thigh, still trapped beneath his jeans, hard for him, and, Jesus, so big. They could get a room, later. A clean, white place with an enormous bed. Soft cotton sheets and white linen curtains. Sam could spread him out and work him open, get Dean ready to take him. Or else he could do the same thing to Sam—get his mouth on him, his fingers. Take him apart, learn exactly the way Sam liked it.
The thought made him shudder. His breath hitched. He tried to bury his face in the hood of the car, but Sam held his chin back with a gentle hand, stopping him. Dean could see the sky hanging over his shoulder. It was dark blue, and full of stars.
“Yeah, come on, that’s it,” Sam murmured against his neck, “Tell me, Dean. Tell me what you want.”
It cut through him like an axe, right to the core of him. Because that was it, the thing everyone knew except for Sam. Dean knew it. Luisa knew it. The ladies who came in everyday from Juarez to clean houses, who kept their heads bent low at the border, and who never did get a ticket to Graceland—they knew it, too. Even Martinez knew it, the poor dumb fuck. You couldn’t always get what you wanted, so you had to take what you could get.
Sam, by some wretched miracle, had never taken this to heart, and now it was liable to send both of them to an early grave. The way he touched Dean—mouthing at Dean’s throat, his pulse; his fingers working him in rough, desperate strokes—said that he wanted it all. As much as Dean could give, and then some.
Sam fumbled at the button of his jeans, drawing out his own cock, and jerked them both off in one giant hand, messy and uncoordinated. It didn’t matter, though—it was him and Sam together, and just that was enough to make him shatter. He bit back a moan as he came into Sam’s hand. Sam followed him, streaking across Dean’s ribs, his belly. He lay there, after, collapsed across Dean’s chest, panting into the junction of Dean’s neck and shoulder, his come drying between both their stomachs.
Dean could hear Sam’s breath in his ear, the rustle of the desert around them. The metal of the Impala chilled his skin. He thought, unexpectedly, of a comic he had read when he was a kid. The main character had returned to his home planet and stood on the edge of an empty landscape that was red and desolate, like this one. That was what this felt like. The edge of everything.
“Next time,” Sam said, “next time, I’m going to blow you.”
Dean shivered. “Christ, Sam,” he said, thumping him on the shoulder. “Warn a guy.”
Sam smiled into his neck.
“Listen,” Dean said, after a few moments, “I hate to spoil the afterglow, but I’m kind of freezing out here, dude.”
Sam hauled them up, and Dean watched, fascinated, as he zipped himself up and tucked his shirt in, frowning at the come drying on his hand and wiping a little of it on his jeans. Yeah, Dean thought. That was going to be a bitch to clean up later. The thought made him stupidly happy.
He meant to get them into the car and on the road, he really did. But instead he stood there a moment, his hip bumping Sam’s, watching their breaths tumble out into the cold night.
“Listen, uh—” He shifted on his feet, rubbing at the fabric of his jacket. He really didn’t want to talk about this, but Sam deserved to know. “I meant it, earlier. It didn’t start as a fight.”
Sam’s brow knitted together. “Okay,” he said, slowly. “Then how did it start?”
“It started, uh. It started more like this.”
“What?”
Dean dug his heel into the dirt and gestured vaguely at the Impala’s hood, as if that would actually be enough to get his point across. Which, apparently, it was.
“Oh,” Sam said, flushing. “Oh. Wow, that—that sucks, man.”
Dean scratched at the back of his neck. “Yeah, well. It was just some guy. It wasn't...” He swallowed. “The point is, I’m not trying to check out ahead of schedule.”
Sam's throat bobbed up and down. “Right,” he said, thickly. “Okay, well. Thanks for letting me know.”
They got into the car. Dean slid into the driver’s seat. He turned on the ignition, rubbed his hands together over the dash, trying to get warm. Beside him, Sam had his head bent low, his eyes fixed on his lap. His hand brushed, hot, against Dean’s thigh. He leaned toward him, very serious. “Dean,” he said, “you know I’m not going to let you die, right?”
Dean drew in a long, deep breath. He thought about a clean white room, four months left, and time enough to map out every inch of his brother. He was going to love Sam with everything he had left, for as long as he had left. He was going to take him down to a place not even Hell could touch.
“I know,” he said, and took Sam’s hand, and squeezed it, and watched as the desert bled out into asphalt and clay.