Chapter Text
THEN
Andra and the old man both came with them to the surgical center in the middle of the night. The place was deserted, the only building in a four block area. The surgeon--a middle aged man who said to just call him “doctor” --seemed less than excited about having to repay Andra for a favor in such a bizarre fashion. Sam couldn’t really blame him.
“Take off your clothes,” he instructed, and Dean sighed and took off his shirt. The sight of his pale freckled shoulders in the harsh light of the exam room, the awkward way he climbed up on the table, his stomach in the way and achingly obvious – it all made Sam’s heart clench, a wave of protectiveness washing over him.
Dean glanced over at him, and the fear Sam could see in his brother’s eyes nearly made his knees buckle.
“Can I stay?” he asked, willing Dean to see how much he wanted to – needed to.
Dean looked at him for a few long moments, and Sam wondered if they should say something meaningful to each other, just in case. Then Dean found his game face again and shrugged as he stripped off his sweat pants. “Suit yourself, Sammy,” he said.
The doctor gave Dean an epidural from a needle that looked absurdly long to Sam, and Sam pushed aside the irrational urge to punch the doctor in the mouth for sticking that in his brother. He put what Sam guessed were the customary drapes for a C section on Dean once he laid down, and started an IV and an oxygen cannula
Christ, this was really happening. And none of them knew if what was going to emerge from Dean’s belly was going to be a human or…
“Think good thoughts,” Andra said, “There’s no reason to expect anything other than a healthy baby.”
Sam tried to unclench his fists as the doctor tested Dean’s perception of sensation and then reached for the scalpel.
To his shock, Sam’s stomach tried to rebel and lose its contents as soon as the first layer of fascia was cut through. This was Dean, and watching someone cut him open felt wrong to Sam on a primal level. It was all he could do to stand still and not look away.
“Sam. Sam, c’mere.”
Dean needed him; Sam moved to stand at his head, put one hand on his bare shoulder to anchor him. And himself.
Dean was trembling, little shivers going through him as the doctor cut deeper.
“Does it hurt?” Sam whispered, his own body so tense he knew he’d be aching later, coiled and ready and screaming for him to protect Dean.
Dean shook his head, brought the hand that didn’t have the IV in it up and laid it over Sam’s. “Tell me what’s happening,” he said. “Please.”
It’s not like Dean couldn’t look down and see too, but this was Dean’s way of making sure that Sam was looking when the doctor pulled a baby’s head right through the slice on Dean’s stomach, tugging it upward. Inch by inch, as Sam held his breath. Dark curls of hair, tiny little shoulders, a skinny arm outstretched and Sam could count five fingers, a tiny round belly, and legs that looked as bowed as the baby’s father’s.
“A boy,” Sam said, and felt Dean’s fingers squeeze his own. “It’s a boy.”
The doctor held him up, looking in awe himself, checking the infant’s features, no doubt counting limbs and fingers and toes.
The baby opened his mouth and took a gasping breath and let out a squall that was unmistakably human.
“Ohmygod,” Dean said, staring up at his son.
Sam forgot himself completely and leaned down and kissed his brother.
* * *
They stayed the weekend at the surgical center since it wouldn’t be opening until Monday morning and thus would be safely deserted. Dean grumbled about wanting to get the hell out of there but Sam agreed with the doctor that this had been a major – and majorly weird – surgery, and infection was always a risk, even if it had been more normal.
Sam held the baby the first night while Dean gave into the sedative the doctor had given him and actually slept.
He unwrapped the hospital blankets to inspect the tiny naked person, turning him over to be sure there were no strange scales or wing buds or, god forbid, a tail starting to sprout, but everything looked – normal.
Sam huffed a laugh. As if anything about this baby could ever be normal.
The baby complained with the beginning of a cry, probably cold without his blankets, and Sam hurriedly wrapped him back up.
“Don’t worry,” he reassured, keeping his voice down so as not to wake Dean. “Nothing about our entire family is normal anyway.”
Wide dark blue eyes peered up at him in the dimly lit room, and Sam found himself smiling. Was this a miracle, like Andra had said?
“Hey, little guy. You hungry? Got a nice bottle right here. I can run it under the hot water, get it a little warm for you. Sorry we can’t – I mean, it’s formula.”
Sam shook his head as the baby kept staring up at him. “It’s just that – well, it’s hard to explain, but you don’t actually have a mom, so there’s no…I mean, nobody has boobs so…”
He stopped and rolled his eyes at himself. There was never going to be any explaining this even when the kid was old enough to understand words.
The baby started to fuss and Sam put him down on the other bed where they’d rolled up towels to make a little enclosure for him. He grabbed a bottle from the little fridge in the corner, running it under hot water until it felt like it might approximate body temperature. Little Dean didn’t seem to mind; he sucked greedily, his eyes slowly closing until he was passed out again, his tiny body heavy in Sam’s arms.
Little Dean, Sam thought, looking over at his brother asleep on the hospital bed. He had his T-shirt back on, but the IV was still in and his bare arms were pale against the sheets. Sam remembered the thin ribbon of red as the scalpel sliced into him, then shook off the memory.
“Okay you, back in your little pseudo crib.”
Sam pulled his chair up next to Dean’s bed and let himself go under too, his head pillowed on the mattress.
He woke to Dean ruffling his hair and the baby fussing.
“Bring him to me and I’ll feed him,” Dean said, voice still gruff with sleep. “Didn’t mean to pass out on you last night.”
“That’s exactly what you were supposed to do.”
Dean made a face, but didn’t argue any more. Sam stood up and stretched, shoulders stiff and sore from being hunched over for hours, then grabbed a bottle from the fridge and held it under the water while Dean cranked up the bed to sit up.
“Heats it up,” he explained when Dean threw him a questioning look.
“Look at you, being a great mom already.”
Sam shot his brother a fuck you look, but Dean was smiling so he couldn’t really sustain it. And honestly, if it made Dean feel better to call him the mom after being the one to actually carry the baby for nine months, Sam could take it.
Dean propped himself up on the pillows and held out his arms for the now squalling baby.
“He’s got some good lungs, huh?” Dean asked, and the fact that he looked proud when he said it made Sam smile.
“Takes after you probably,” Sam agreed. “Always gotta make your opinion known.”
“Pfft,” Dean protested as Sam put the baby in his arms. “You might not be as loud as me, but you damn sure make your opinion known too.”
Sam handed him the bottle and he tilted it just right for the baby to suckle. It made Sam so unexpectedly emotional to see Dean with the baby that he didn’t even have a comeback.
The old man and Andra showed up with a car seat from Costco on Sunday night. Sam paid them for all their expenses and then some, and they helped strap the baby into it while Sam tried to force Dean to let himself be helped getting into the passenger seat of the car.
“Not a baby, Sam,” he grumbled, but he was still moving stiffly and clearly in some pain. The doctor had pronounced the incision to be healing well, and they had some antibiotics just in case, but Sam didn’t want to take any chances. All his life he’d been terrified that something would happen to take Dean away from him. It had happened twice already, in the jaws of the hellhounds and whisked away to Purgatory, and Sam was not letting it happen again. Especially not now.
He felt a tremendous surge of gratitude when the doors to the bunker finally closed behind them, along with a not inconsequential wave of terror. They had a baby now – how the hell were they going to do this?
“You go lie down, I’ll give Little Dean a bottle and get him changed.”
Dean stood there looking at him instead.
“You know, Sam, you can’t keep calling him Little Dean. That’s what I call my dick.”
“I – that – jesus, Dean, what the hell?”
Dean shrugged. “I’m just saying, he needs a better name than that.”
“I’m used to calling him Dean,” Sam protested, and as soon as he said it, he realized how true it was.
Dean sat down at the map table, wincing as he did. “Might get confusing when he’s older, don’t ya think?”
Sam honestly hadn’t thought about the baby getting older at all. Being a kid. Being a teenager. Being a man.
Sam sat down, feeling queasy. Dean put a hand on his shoulder, worried.
“Hey, you okay?”
“Yeah I just – I guess I wasn’t thinking that far ahead is all. Jesus, Dean, we’ve got a baby here – I mean, he’s here and he’s – I guess he’s gonna stay here, he’s gonna grow up!”
Dean nodded patiently. “Uh huh, that’s usually how it goes.”
“How can you be so calm?”
“I guess I’ve had nine months for the reality to sink in. Looks like it’s just hittin’ you now.”
Dean looked a little amused.
“Fuck you,” Sam said. He was suddenly so tired he felt like he could fall over at any moment.
“Too tired,” Dean answered amiably, and then they both paused and stared at each other. Dean was no longer pregnant, and the evidence that they had in fact already fucked was gearing up for some impressive crying, impossible to ignore.
“We’re gonna have to talk about it sooner or later,” Sam said, and Dean rubbed his eyes.
“Not now,” he countered. He picked up the baby and pulled a bottle out of the backpack they were using as a diaper bag, popping it in the baby’s mouth without any warm up attempts.
“It’s fine,” he said at Sam’s reproachful look. “You never complained.”
They both watched the baby drink with enthusiasm for a few minutes.
“How about Dean Jr.?”
Dean frowned, looking from Sam to the baby and then back.
“You really want him named after me?”
Sam realized he very much did. He tried to be casual when he answered so Dean didn’t get too freaked out about that.
“I guess. Just seems to make sense. Anyway, I’m used to it. And we can call him DJ or something.”
Dean looked down at the baby, a soft smile on his face that he probably wasn’t aware of.
“Okay,” he said finally. DJ finished the last few drops of the bottle and Dean laid him over his shoulder and patted his back. “Hey, Sam?”
“Yeah?”
“Did we buy any uh… baby stuff? Like clothes or diapers or – like somewhere for him to sleep?”
“I sorta didn’t want to jinx anything by assuming…” Sam began, and Dean motioned his agreement.
Neither of them had dared to believe that the universe would not – as it always had before – make a mockery of any hope they might have held for a positive outcome. Certainly not when the supernatural was involved.
The baby, draped over Dean’s shoulder, burped out an impressive amount of air.
“Thatta boy,” Dean said proudly.
The first night DJ slept in a bureau drawer lined with a few towels, in the single onesie that Andra had very considerately brought to the hospital. The next day Sam spent more money at Walmart than he ever had in his life.
* * *
Sam had no idea babies were so much work.
The first few months went by in a blur of not sleeping enough and trying to get used to the fact that the baby was real and not something that Sam had dreamt or hallucinated.
On a Tuesday morning that was like every other morning, 8 am came and went and Dean didn’t appear in the kitchen like he usually did, wrapped up in the dead guy robe and grumbling with his hair a mess and a hint of dark circles under his eyes. Sam gave DJ his bottle and put him down for a morning nap at 9 and went to check on his brother.
Was all this too good to be true after all? Had Dean been damaged in some way they hadn’t realized? Sam threw open the door with more force than he intended, the anxiety making his adrenaline spike.
Dean rolled over and sat up, blinking and sleep rumpled in a faded grey tee shirt.
“Sam? Is the baby okay?”
“You’re okay,” Sam answered instead, and Dean frowned.
“Huh?”
He looked worried suddenly, and Sam shook his head hurriedly.
“DJ is fine, sorry, didn’t mean to worry you, he’s napping.”
Dean frowned again, confused. He ran a hand through his unruly hair and it made Sam smile. Even with a crease on one side of his face and his hair sticking up like a hedgehog, Dean looked beautiful. And fine.
“Sorry, sorry – it’s after 9 and you’re usually up by now. I – I got worried.”
Dean swung his legs over the side of the bed, and Sam took in his pale freckled thighs and black boxer briefs. He looked at Sam with one eyebrow cocked. “I slept in and you – got worried about me?”
It was as good an invitation as any for a conversation that was long overdue. Sam crossed the room and sat down beside his brother.
“I’m only just now starting to let myself believe that you’re not gonna die.”
“I’m not…” Dean started to say, but Sam hushed him with a hand.
“I’m only daring to believe you’re actually gonna be okay now,” he went on. “That you’re not gonna explode from the inside and fucking die, and – and it would’ve been all my fault, it would’ve been me who did that to you, me who put that inside you and who went along with asking you to do something inconceivable, something that’s too much to ask of anyone – that we didn’t know if it would work. I mean, why did we think it would work?”
“Sam,” Dean said, and shifted on the bed, moving closer so that their knees were touching.
“No really Dean, think about it, you could’ve died – you probably should’ve died, nothing about that was normal, and it was dangerous, it was fucking dangerous, and I let you do it, and I looked at you every day and I didn’t know – I didn’t know if you were gonna survive it, Dean! What would I have done? What?”
“Hey, hey,” Dean soothed, in that voice that had gotten Sam through every nightmare, from the time he was a little kid tormented by dreams of monsters until he was a grown man tormented by visions. “I’m okay, Sam, I’m fine.”
“But you could’ve not been, the odds weren’t good, you could’ve been – god Dean, you coulda been…”
Sam couldn’t bring himself to say it again, and to his embarrassment he felt his eyes water and his voice catch as a sob broke from him that he couldn’t contain.
“Sammy,” Dean said, soft, and then his arms were around Sam’s shoulders pulling him in.
Sam fell against his brother’s chest, ducking his head instinctively so Dean could hold him like the big brother he was. All the terror of those long months, and all the heartbreak that came before, bubbled up out of Sam, his tears dampening Dean’s tee shirt where Sam’s face was pressed against his chest.
“It’s okay, I know,” Dean said, his fingers carding through Sam’s hair. “I’m here, okay? I’m here.”
The sobs subsided but Sam was reticent to move from where he was. They hadn’t hugged in a long time, and the feel of Dean’s arms around him, Dean’s fingers stroking his hair, made Sam feel safer than he had in even longer.
“You still think about it?” Dean asked, after they’d sat there quietly for a while.
Sam didn’t bother to ask what.
“Yeah.”
Dean’s fingers didn’t stop their soothing motion, untangling Sam’s long locks, tugging a little every now and then.
“How often?”
It was easier to be honest when his face was buried in Dean’s chest.
“Pretty often.”
“Mmmm” Dean hummed. He slid his hand a little lower and rubbed the back of Sam’s neck. It felt heavenly. “When you jerk off?”
Sam tensed, but Dean’s fingers kept rubbing his neck and he didn’t want to pull away to see the expression on Dean’s face.
“You fucking with me?”
Dean huffed a little laugh. “No Sam, it’s a real question. Do you think of it when you whack off?”
“No.”
Dean’s hand paused for a second, maybe unconsciously, and then resumed. But the pause had happened and it gave Sam the courage to keep talking.
“Not it. Not then. That time, you were about to die, and I don’t wanna remember that part. But….you. I think of you.”
Dean’s hand paused again, and Sam could feel him draw a breath, his chest rising under Sam’s cheek. The moment seemed to drag on, Sam wondering if Dean was about to push him away, plunge them back into a denial they’d have to live with for the rest of their lives, no matter what the Brigora had wanted to teach them.
Dean’s fingers squeezed the nape of his neck, and in a whisper that Sam could only hear because he was so close, he said “Yeah, me too.”
Sam pulled back, needing to see the expression on Dean’s face now.
Dean blinked back, his eyes soft, no trace of a smirk on his mouth.
“Never gonna be anyone else for me,” Sam said, because he wasn’t sure Dean had ever really understood. “Hasn’t been for a long time.”
Dean slid the hand he’d had on the back of Sam’s neck down to his shoulder, then lifted it to Sam’s face. In slow motion, he pressed his fingertips to Sam’s mouth, and Sam felt it like an electric shock. His lips parted instinctively, and Dean smiled a little, ran his fingers over the bow of Sam’s upper lip and then down to his chin.
“You sure?” Dean asked. His voice was gravel, still sleep rough, and the words went straight to Sam’s dick, like it was hard wired to respond to Dean’s words.
“So sure,” Sam said, and reached over to touch Dean’s mouth in return, thrilling to the way his full lips parted and Dean’s eyes went dark.
“Okay,” Dean whispered, and the tip of his tongue nudged hot and wet against Sam’s fingertips, and Sam couldn’t stifle the whimper that slipped out.
They leaned in at the same time, eyes locked together, slowly enough that the other could back out and call this insanity. Sam held Dean’s gaze until they were too close, and then his mouth was on Dean’s and Dean’s warm wet tongue was pushing against his own and the electric shocks were all over him, his entire body on fire and wanting.
Dean’s fingers slipped into Sam’s hair again, grabbing a handful as their kiss turned rougher, deeper. Sam wrapped his arms around Dean’s back, pulled them even closer together, fingers spread to span the breadth of Dean’s broad back. He could feel the muscles there, the strength.
They pushed against each other, hungry, until the force of Dean’s kiss made Sam fall back on the bed. He pulled Dean with him and they collapsed on the welcoming memory foam, Dean half on top of him, their teeth gnashing together as they grappled, trying to get even closer. Sam slid his hands lower and grabbed Dean’s waist, hauling him where Sam wanted him, the warm weight of him welcome, real. Sam could feel Dean’s erection through the thin barrier of briefs and Sam’s sweatpants; he shifted his hips to line them up, and as soon as Dean felt their cocks slide together he gasped and thrust down.
It felt fucking incredible, bursts of pleasure running through Sam, making his dick even harder. He slid his hands lower and grabbed Dean’s ass, fingers digging into the flesh and muscle and encouraging Dean to grind against him. They bucked against each other, awkward and increasingly desperate, kisses becoming sporadic as they concentrated on the rhythm they needed, arousal spurring them to go faster, harder.
“Fuck, fuck,” Dean muttered against Sam’s mouth, and Sam ground out a “Don’t stop”. It felt like he might die if Dean did, if they couldn’t keep going, if they couldn’t get there together. Sam didn’t know how long it had been since he’d been with anyone other than his right hand, but he couldn’t remember ever feeling such need for someone, both to take and to give to.
Dean lifted his hips and Sam sobbed, unable to stop himself, but then he felt Dean’s hands on his stomach, shoving his sweatpants down far enough to free his aching cock. When Dean ground down on him again, his shorts pushed down too, it was dick against dick and Sam cried out with the ecstasy of it, his hips jumping as he arched up off the bed to get more of that delicious pressure.
“Christ, Sam,” Dean muttered, and then the world spun disorientingly for a moment as Dean flipped them so that Sam was on top, his hands clutching Sam’s ass to smash their bodies back together.
Sam couldn’t bite back the growl that burst from him at the sight of Dean beneath him, his eyes blown nearly black and his mouth bitten blood red from Sam’s kisses. He pushed his cock against Dean’s, thrilling to the feel of silky hard flesh against him. They were both leaking, the slick making the slide easy as they bucked together. Sam leaned down to kiss his brother and Dean craned his neck up for it, eager. His T-shirt was damp, and the room smelled like them, their sex and their sweat, and Sam never wanted it to end. Dean got a fistful of his hair and pulled it, rough and possessive, echoing the possessive thrust of Sam’s body pinning him down, the two of them pumping against each other’s bodies, fast and hard and perfect, until Sam felt Dean tense and spill between them with a strangled moan. Sam shoved into all that delicious warm wetness and came too, both of them grinding together again and again until every ounce of pleasure had been wrung from them.
Dean gave him a good minute to catch his breath and savor the afterglow before he pushed Sam to the side and off.
“Weigh a ton,” he complained good-naturedly.
Sam lay on his back and looked up at the ceiling and tried to wipe the grin off his face.
Dean turned his head to stare.
“That good, huh?”
“I hate you.”
Dean poked him in the side. “Nah.”
Sam took a deep breath, looked around at the photo of DJ the hospital had given them, propped up on the nightstand. The baby monitor on the bureau. The dirty diapers piled in the too-small trash can.
“Nah,” he agreed.
Dean poured them some whiskeys that evening, after DJ had gone down for the night. “Wanna talk about it?”
Sam shrugged.
“Gonna be a hard thing to explain,” Dean said, taking a sip of his drink. “Two dudes who had a baby. Who are brothers.”
Sam nodded. He didn’t think they’d probably be explaining it like that to many people. He took another sip of whiskey, savoring the warmth that suffused him. It had been there since the morning, a better warmth than alcohol had ever given him. Dean was looking at him, trying to read his mind.
“I love that you’re my brother,” Sam said, and Dean raised an eyebrow, listening closely. His hand - that had tangled in Sam’s hair that morning, stripped Sam’s sweatpants down to free his dick, grabbed Sam’s ass to encourage him to fuck down harder and make them both come – wrapped around the whiskey glass. Sam licked his lips.
“I love that you’re my brother, but that’s not why I love you. I just….do.”
Dean took another sip and then put down the glass. He slid his hand across the table and laid it over Sam’s.
“You’re always gonna be my baby brother, Sam.”
Sam nodded, turning his hand over to entwine his fingers with Dean’s.
“But yeah,” Dean went on, giving Sam’s hand a squeeze. “That’s not why. I – me too.”
* * *
PRESENT DAY
The other one comes to the church just one time.
Father Maguire caught a glimpse of him before he ducked into the confessional, lurking in the back of the church and looking reluctant to approach. For a second, the priest thought for sure it was the mysterious man who comes to confession every now and then – the stranger is tall, and carries himself with the same predatory grace, as though he’s always prepared for and maybe expecting danger. As soon as the man opens his mouth to speak, he knows it’s not.
“Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good,” the priest says. There’s no rote reply and for a minute the priest wonders if the man is going to flee. Then he clears his throat.
“Yeah, I’m sure he is sometimes. But I didn’t come to talk about him.”
“How long has it been since your last confession?”
The man laughs. “A long time, I guess. Would probably take too long if I started going through all my sins, and I don’t think you’d really want to hear them.”
“God always has time to listen,” Father Maguire reassures, and the man snorts.
“Well, that ain’t true, but whatever, I didn’t come here to talk about me.”
Father Maguire is only human; his interest is piqued. He waits to see what the stranger will say.
“I know my – my Sam – comes here sometimes.”
Father Maguire knows instantly. This is Dean, the man his mystery confessor has talked so much about. The man whose denial almost destroyed them both. Father Maguire's only-human side wishes he’d paid more attention to this man lurking around the back of the church before he finally entered the confessional. He pushes his curiosity about what the mysterious partner looks like aside, chiding himself for the way his mind has strayed.
Sam. The mysterious man is named Sam. It fits him.
“Go on,” he encourages.
“I get it, why he feels bad, why he questions this. What we have. It’s not – it’s not the usual, you know? Hell, most people would say it’s wrong, I get that.”
“And what do you think?” the priest asks, remembering Sam’s questions; his struggle to try to do the right thing.
“I never expected to be normal, never wanted it. Wasn’t raised to it. But Sam, he did. For a while at least, he did.”
“And you’re worried that he gave that up – for you?”
“You a shrink or a priest?” the man asks, and Father Maguire can imagine the smirk on his face.
“A little of both sometimes,” he allows.
The man laughs; it makes him sound younger suddenly. “Fair enough. I don’t have a lot of experience with either. But yeah, he kinda did.”
“If your – your Sam – is a grown man, I’m guessing he can make his own decisions. Perhaps it’s just hard to let him.”
There’s a long pause, and then the man answers, his voice a little softer.
“You don’t know the half of it. You’re right, he’s grown now. I forget sometimes.”
“And what about you?” the priest asks. “Do you think Sam worries about what you’ve given up?”
No pause this time.
“Nothing that wasn’t worth it a million times over. What we have now, all three of us, it’s nothing I ever dared to hope for.”
“Mm hmm,” the priest acknowledges. “Maybe Sam feels the same way.”
The man sits quietly again for a few moments. Father Maguire can hear the sound of him scrubbing at his face, the scratch of some late day stubble against his fingers.
“Maybe,” he allows, and then the priest can hear him get up to leave.
“Are you looking to do some penance?”
The man scoffs. “No sir, done plenty of that already.”
Father Maguire listens to him start to make his way out, then shuffle back and speak again.
“He thinks sometimes that I don’t want this, that I gave in that first time only because I had to. He’s wrong.”
And then he’s gone, his footsteps loud and swift with purpose on the wooden floor.
“Go in peace,” Father Maguire says aloud.
He has the sense that Sam and Dean have been looking for peace for a long time – and that maybe they’ve finally found it.
Fin