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Since the incident in Colorado, Sam had finally started to forgive him for the whole mess with Gadreel and everything that came after. A weight has been off Dean's mind, lulling him into a false sense of security. For the last couple of months, things between them have been steadily improving, or at least, they had been. In the last week or so, there's been a calculating look in Sam's eye whenever he looks at Dean, that Dean can't stand seeing any more.
"Just spit it out already, Sam, goddamn it," he snapped one morning, putting down his coffee cup with way more force than necessary.
"What?" said Sam, deliberately obtuse. Dean glared at him in frustration.
"Whatever it is that's got you walking on eggshells. Just give it to me straight."
Sam snorted like Dean said something amusing, but he couldn't see what. But Sam stood up and stepped forwards, further into Dean's personal space than he would usually breach.
"Okay, look. I've been trying to think of way to say this where you won't either bail on me or punch me in the face, but since I can't think of one-"
Sam cut himself off abruptly, but before Dean had the chance to ask what the hell he was talking about, Sam had closed the distance between them and planted one on him. Literally, those were Sam's lips touching his. Dean's mouth was currently being violated by Sam's wind-chapped lips.
Dean went rigid with shock, before he flailed around ineffectually, trying to get free. Sam was holding the top of his arms, up by his shoulders, pressing their lips together with his eyes closed, the big girl. At least their lips were shut and there were no tongues involved, thank god. Then Sam nipped his bottom lip, what the fuck- but before Dean could punch him in the stomach, or possibly knee him in the nuts, Sam let go and stepped back, with his thinking face on.
"Huh," he mused, "That wasn't as weird as I thought it was gonna be."
"Wasn't weird? That wasn't weird for you?" Dean repeated, incredulously.
There was a flask of holy water in Sam's jacket, hanging on the chair in front of him. He snatched it up and doused his brother in it, which only resulted in a soggy Sam. Sam rolled his eyes, wiping off his face with a chuckle. For a minute or two, Dean was speechless, with a trauma-inducing mixture of shock and fury. And then it burst out of him.
"Well, congratulations, Sam! I'm pretty sure we've now broken every natural, legal, moral or religious law, drawn up by man or god, since the dawn of fucking creation. Just when I thought it wasn't possible for us to damn ourselves any more than we already have. You just had to go and add incest to that long list of shitty decisions."
"Technically, I don't think it really counts as incest unless there are sex acts involved. Some people just kiss their relatives on the mouth anyway." said Sam.
"Sex acts?" Dean repeated, revolted. "What the fuck, Sam! Did you hit your head in the shower this morning or something?"
"No, dude, just hear me out, all right?"
Sam went to touch him, and Dean skittered backwards out of his reach, like a nervous rabbit. It would be earning him all kinds of grief from Sam on a regular day, but wasn't the slightest bit comical here, in this freaking Twilight Zone he'd found himself in.
"No, no, no. There's nothing to talk about Sam. I'm going to go find something to kill, and you're gonna find yourself some goddamn therapy sessions, Jesus Christ!"
Without another word, Dean stalked through the library and into the labyrinth of the bunker's passageways, until he reached his own bedroom. He slammed the door behind himself, sinking back against the sturdy wood and rubbing one hand across his face. He had no idea what had just happened, but he was resolved to not think about it again, ever.
Sam, of course, had other plans.
---
Contrary to Dean's beliefs on the matter, Sam hadn't kissed him out of the blue. Since the whole mess with Gadreel, Sam had been spending more time with Cas, and if there was anyone who understood Dean Winchester's motivations, it was Castiel. The angel had helped Sam come to terms with Dean's obsessive need to save him, even at the cost of Sam's free will. It was a hard road, with plenty of bumps along the way, but Cas had been an invaluable source of comfort and reassurance. One of the most helpful recommendations he'd made was for Sam to read-up on the Winchester Gospels (as Cas insisted on calling them).
And he'd been so, so right to do it. The books revealed far more about Dean's inner motivations than Sam had previously realised, his previous involvement with the novels having been skim-reading for the basics, back when they had first discovered them. Now, he read the online copies Charlie had told them about, electing to ignore any and all fansites as much as possible. The fans were still mostly rabid as far as he was concerned, an image of Becky Rosen insisting they were married and in love swimming in his mind whenever he thought on it too hard.
Fangirls aside, Sam had found the books to be a goldmine. So much of their history was laid bare open, including flashback chapters to some of Dean's hunts when he'd been at Stanford. There were even some childhood memories Sam had next to no recollection of, having been too little to hold onto the incidents the first time around. But now he could read up about Dean's guilt and regret over the shtriga that almost got Sam as a kid, and all the other little pieces of his brother that were kept hidden behind his macho, sarcastic attitude.
Reading about his first death had been the weirdest of all. He'd had no idea Dean had deliberated so long before bringing him back; his impression at the time was that it had been an immediate, snap decision. The fact that Dean had spent two whole days holed up with Sam's rotting corpse - which they were going to have words about at some point because ew - it almost made everything worse. Dean had time to think it through, to mull over all the pros and cons. Okay, so they hadn't known about Heaven back then, but he'd still chosen eternal damnation and a lifetime of guilt for Sam.
A flicker of old rage had swelled up in him, reading "All Hell Breaks Loose", but Sam suppressed it, because there were more important issues to deal with. Namely, Dean's lousy opinion of himself. Sam had always known Dean was a self-loathing son of a bitch, but the more he read, the more it sickened him, how little Dean thought of himself. And it was something Sam vowed he would change, if it was the last thing he ever did.
There were more secrets in Dean's past than he'd realised. Occasionally, there were passing lines in the books, which seemed to suggest Dean had been in far more dangerous situations than Sam had known when they were teenagers. Dean's slight obsession with eating large portions of unhealthy food made a hell of a lot more sense when viewed in the context that Dean often went hungry to ensure Sam could eat. And there was the odd paragraph here and there which turned Sam's stomach; run-ins with the CPS, and teenage Dean getting propositioned in dive bars by rednecks thinking he was a hooker, or worse, the implication that he might actually have been one. Sam had to rush to the bathroom to throw up, when he understood that's what the book was getting at. It was never explicitly confirmed, and in the end, he gave up and went to the fan forums for clarification.
How terrible a brother did it make him, that he had to rely on complete strangers, who thought they were fictional characters, to discover the truth about his brother? Unfortunately, the jury was still out on whether or not Dean had ever resorted to such desperate measures, to put food in Sam's greedy, ungrateful mouth. The more he read, the more Sam wanted to curl up beside his brother and beg his forgiveness. But Dean would never forgive him for violating his privacy like this, and so Sam determined to find another way to pay his brother back for all the ways he'd looked out for him.
Sam didn't always approve of Dean's choices, but the more he read, the more he understood why Dean had made them. And it was about time Sam made some choices for the two of them, choices Dean would no doubt disapprove of, even though they were in his best interest. But Dean could fight him all he wanted; Sam had a plan and he wasn't going to get derailed.
Dean deserved to be happy, and Sam was going to make it happen.