SPN fic: To the place I belong

[withdiamonds]

Title: To the place I belong
Characters: Sam, Dean, Bobby
Word count: 4800
Rating: PG
Warnings: none
Summary: Dean's tired, but Sam wants to keep going for as long as he can. Future!fic.
Notes: Written for spn_summergen. I wrote this for embroiderama, which was great fun, since she was also my recipient for spnspringfling. (Two gen stories in a row, both for the same person. I was so inspired, my Big Bang ended up being gen, too.) I used her prompt "Dean stops hunting and settles down, but Sam keeps hunting until a permanent injury makes him stop." And now I get to post it with all the typos fixed, which is very exciting. Oh, and the title is from "Take Me Home, County Roads" by John Denver. So many thanks to topaz119, as usual, for the beta.







"I'm tired, Sam."

"Yeah, dude, me too." Sam peered out into the night. There wasn't much to see, considering they were on a long stretch of deserted highway in the middle of South Dakota.

Of course, Sam had to look anyway. "You wanna pull over, let me drive for a while? 'Cause I'm not seeing anywhere to stop and get a room around here."

Dean gripped the steering wheel tighter. He hadn't meant to say that, didn't want to have this conversation right now. He could take the out, pretend that's all he'd meant - that he just needed Sam to take the wheel for a little while.

Or he could finish what he started, even if starting it was a poorly thought-out impulse.

Oh, Dean had thought about what he wanted. He'd thought about it plenty. He'd just been too much of a chickenshit to open his mouth and let the words out.

"Dean?"

"That's not what I meant, Sam." Okay, he was apparently going for it. He waited, but Sam didn't say anything. "Sammy, I'm tired of –" Dean waved one hand around, trying to encompass everything that he no longer wanted to deal with. "I'm tired of this," he finished, hoping Sam would just get it so he didn't have to talk about it.

"What are you saying?" Sam asked. Dean rolled his eyes and sighed. Naturally Sam wanted him to spell it out.

"I've had enough," Dean said simply. "I want out." He drew a deep breath and braved a glance at Sam. "I'm tired," he said again.

Sam didn't argue. He just nodded and looked thoughtful.



And that was how Dean found himself, not a month later, living in a small, slightly rundown house on the outskirts of Woonsocket, South Dakota.

He'd picked this place for a variety of reasons. It was just a couple of hours down the road from Bobby – an hour and fifteen minutes if Dean was in the right mood. It was a small town where everybody seemed to mind their own business, and let's face it, the name was awesome.

Woonsocket. How was that not an awesome name for a town?

"I think all the alcohol's put holes in your brain, kid," Bobby said.

Dean raised his glass of whiskey in a salute and shrugged. "Come on, it's an awesome name," he said, and tossed off his drink in one swallow. Bobby didn’t exactly keep good sipping whiskey around the place. You had to man up and down it real quick for the sake of your taste buds. Dean would rather not go through life with scorched taste buds.

Rufus always kept good whiskey, mostly because he didn't let people in the front door unless they brought it with them. Dean never said it out loud, but Rufus was one of the reasons he'd wanted to stop hunting. He was sure Bobby didn’t need to hear that, although Bobby wasn't stupid. He knew. It was just that they didn't talk about Rufus much.

Or Pamela, or Ellen and Jo, or Cas, or any of the other friends and family they'd lost.

Dean grimaced at the burn of whiskey down his gullet. "Fucking heartburn," he muttered. "Getting old sucks."

"Aw, cry me a river," Bobby said. "Just wait 'til you're actually old. Good thing I won't be around then to listen you bitch about every little ache and pain."

Dean didn't have a whole lot to say to that, and Bobby fell silent, too. They sat and drank for a while, the quiet peaceful and comforting in a way it had seldom been before.

"All right," Dean finally said, hauling himself up from Bobby's kitchen table. "I'm gonna head out." The late afternoon sun was making a brave attempt to shine through the dirty window over the sink. "I want to get home before dark."

Home. That still sounded stranger than fiction.

"Why, your eyesight going, too, old man?" Bobby's lips twitched in a smile he'd never admit to.

"You're hilarious," Dean said. "Don't keel over before I manage to get back here to visit your ass again."

The sun was almost below the horizon by the time Dean got back to his house, but that was fine. The place looked better in the dark, anyway. The peeling paint and sagging front porch were harder to make out without daylight calling attention to them.

His phone beeped with a text message while he was putting together some supper. Dean wiped his hands on his jeans and put the pan of frozen lasagna in the oven before he looked at the message.

Portland. Ghost in high school. Real bastard. See you next week.

Oregon or Maine? Dean texted back, even though he knew very well that Sam was in Oregon, unless he'd mastered teleportation or taken to flying from gig to gig, because he'd been in Sacramento just two days ago.

Sam ignored him, so Dean texted him again. Any hot cheerleaders? Sam would ignore that one, too.

Over the next few days, Dean worked on the porch. There were a couple of loose boards he wanted to replace before he stuck his leg through one of them and ended up having to call Bobby to come pull him out of his own porch.

He'd rather lay there and rot than give Bobby that satisfaction, so he got the new boards in place, sanded down the worst of the rough wood, and went into town to buy some deck stain.

Woonsocket was a pretty small town, only about 700 people, and while everyone was curious about the new guy, they were curious from a respectable distance.

It was one of the things Dean liked best about the place.

He stood in the hardware store and debated paint colors for the porch railing for a good ten minutes before he snapped out of it and grabbed a can of white.

"Come on, Dean," he said under his breath. "You're not Martha Fucking Stewart."



The porch was looking pretty good and feeling safe enough to walk on by the time Sam showed up. He let out a whistle as he unfolded himself from the front seat of his truck.

"Porch looks awesome, dude," he said as Dean came out of the front door. "I'm impressed."

"Don't sound so surprised, Sammy," Dean said. Neither one of them mentioned the year Dean spent working construction once upon a time. Sam had kept his promise and never brought up Lisa and Ben, which Dean thought was maybe more than he deserved, but he was grateful for it nonetheless.

Sam grinned, and Dean reached up and smacked him on the back of the head. "You hungry?"

"I could eat," Sam said agreeably.

Over Dean's special casserole, consisting of hamburger, beans, macaroni, and cheddar cheese, topped with ketchup, which he'd been making for Sam for most of their lives, Sam told Dean about the hunt in Portland, and Dean told Sam all about the hot cashier at the hardware store, who had totally been hitting on him the other day.

"I'll bet she's half your age, you perv," Sam said. "Hey," he continued, talking right over Dean's indignant protest, "I told Bobby we'd come over to the house tomorrow. There's a book I want to look at."

Dean knew Sam talked to Bobby probably just as often as Dean did, so he wasn't surprised. "Sounds like a plan."



Bobby clapped Sam on the shoulder, and Sam smiled affectionately down at him. Dean bitched about the state of Bobby's yard to cover his happiness that they were all three here, together and alive.

"Almost put a scratch on my baby pulling in here. I swear to God, Bobby, if you don't move some of that junk out of the way…"

"Yeah, yeah," Bobby said. "Lighten up, wouldja?" He turned to Sam. "That brother of yours don't do nothing but bitch these days."

"How is that any different from the way it's always been?" Sam asked, grinning.

"Bite me," Dean scowled and stomped ahead of them into the house.

Sam got his book, and Bobby made them ham sandwiches for lunch.

"Feels good to be here, Bobby," Sam said, toasting Bobby with his beer.

"Feels good to have ya," Bobby agreed, toasting him back.

"Shoot me now," Dean muttered.

"Don’t tempt me," Bobby said.



Dean liked having Sam around, although he understood Sam's desire to keep hunting. It had to do with his need for atonement, and Dean got that, he really did.

If Dean didn't think it was necessary, well, that was a conversation they weren't going to have anytime soon. Dean respected Sam's issues, and Sam left Dean to wallow in his own.

It worked out well for both of them.

Sam stayed three days this time, which was longer than he usually hung around. Dean did his best to pretend he wasn't pleased to have him, and Sam did his best to pretend he didn't notice.

"I'm tracking mud all over your clean kitchen floor?" Sam asked incredulously. "Mud? On your floor? What are you, a desperate housewife?"

Dean just glowered and shoved at Sam's shoulder, grumbling about Sam's big feet and even bigger shoes.

Sam grinned at him and traipsed around the kitchen one more time before Dean snapped him on the ass with a dishtowel.



"I'll probably swing through here again in about a month," Sam said as he tossed his duffel into the cab of his truck.

Dean tried not to let his disappointment at the length of time show, saying, "Okay, whatever works for you. I'll be here when you get back."

Sam studied his face. "You're not exactly on the main drag between New Orleans and Baltimore, dude," Sam said, more gently than Dean was comfortable with.

Sam thought there were either water wraiths or ghost ships in both places, and Dean had given him tips on where to go in New Orleans for a good time.

"Fuck off," Dean said.

Sam hopped into his truck and waved one more time before fishtailing out of Dean's driveway.

"Showoff," Dean yelled after him.

Dean tried not to sigh at the sudden silence. He looked around his small yard and realized that the fence next to the sidewalk could definitely use a coat or two of paint. And maybe he could plant a bush or something where the fence turned the corner by the driveway.

It was still early enough in the morning that the hardware store wouldn't be open yet, but if he drove out by the expressway, he could hit Home Depot by the time they opened.

He was not bored without Sam there. He had plenty of things to keep him occupied, and if he wanted someone to talk to, well, that was why he had satellite TV.



By the time Sam got things straightened out in Baltimore and New Orleans – cursed objects, as it turned out, not wraiths or ghost ships at all – there were new shutters on the house, the front door had been re-planed, repainted, and re-hung, and, heaven help him, Dean had planted an honest-to-God apple tree in the backyard. Of course, it was only three feet tall, but someday there would be apples, because if there weren't, that pimply-faced kid at Homer's Nursery was going to hear about it.

Sam didn't say anything about all the home improvements when he climbed out of his truck, but he bit back a smile as he looked around the place.

"Shut up," Dean growled.

"Dude," Sam said.

Sam told him about the cases while they did the dishes after supper. Dean hated to dry, and he'd always made Sam do it when they were kids and Dad was on one of his we don't need to live like wild animals, you know kicks.

Sam automatically picked up the dishtowel to start drying, and Dean felt something warm tingle in his chest.

He flicked soapy water at Sam to cover his contentment.

Bobby came over the next day, glaring when Dean asked if he needed to lie down after such a long journey.

"You ain't never been as funny as you think you are," he said.

"I've been telling him that for years," Sam said.

"Hey, I’m a regular laugh riot," Dean said smugly.

It turned out Bobby had a lead on a rugaru not too far down the road and as he put it, "I've dealt with more than my fair share of those bastards. You wanna take care of it, Sam?"

"Sure," Sam shrugged. "I'll head out tomorrow."

Dean stopped himself just in time, before he said, Hey, you just got here. There was no way he was making Sam feel guilty about leaving again so soon, and seriously, what the hell? Dean could live without Sam for more than five minutes at a time.

"Get a grip, Dean," he muttered to himself as he rummaged around in the refrigerator for another beer.



When the call came from the hospital, Dean stared at the caller ID for a full thirty seconds before he answered it. He would have given almost anything not to have to hear whatever they were going to say.

"Hello?" he finally said into the phone. He had to clear his throat and try again. "Hello," he said more firmly.

"Dean Fogarty?" a bored-sounding female voice asked.

Okay, if they sounded bored, maybe Sam wasn't – "Yeah, sure, yes," Dean managed to say.

"This is Buena Vista Regional Medical Center in Storm Lake, Iowa. We have your brother, Sam Fogarty, here as a patient. He was in an accident and has sustained several injuries, one of them fairly serious."

"Is he – I mean, can he –" Jesus Christ, why couldn't they just tell him what was wrong?

"He's conscious and has been asking for you. He says that you only live a few hours away. His doctor will speak with you when you arrive. We'll be expecting you."

Her duty apparently done, she waited only for him to stammer acknowledgement into the phone before she hung up.

Dean stood helplessly in the middle of his kitchen while his brain went into overdrive, imagining all kinds of horrific scenarios. Sam dead, Sam in a permanent coma, Sam blind, missing his arms and legs –

He managed to make it to the sink before he threw up. It was gross to see his breakfast again, but puking did manage to knock some sense back into him, and he shook his head to clear it.

Sam was asking for him, therefore he was neither dead nor in a coma.

"Get a grip, Dean," he told himself for the second time in three days. "What the fuck is wrong with you?"

He called Bobby from the car to let him know where he was going.

"Call me when you know anything," was all Bobby said. Dean tossed his phone onto the seat beside him and floored it.

He managed to make the four-hour drive in three, parked the Impala in the Visitor's lot, and then ran into the Emergency Room like there were hellhounds on his heels.

"Sam Win – uh, shit –" For a minute, Dean couldn't remember what alias Sam was using. The chorus of Bad Moon Rising suddenly popped into his head. "Fogarty, Sam Fogarty, please."

"Are you family, sir?" It was the same bored voice from the earlier phone call, and Dean dropped his eyes to the receptionist's nametag.

"Yes, Darla, I am. I'm Sam's brother, Dean. I believe you called me earlier." He kept his voice calm and steady, knowing from past experience that it wouldn't help to piss off the people who actually had the power in a situation like this. He threw in his most charming smile for good measure.

It seemed he hadn't lost his touch, since Darla's voice perked up a little when she said, "Mr. Fogarty has been taken up to his room." She tapped her keyboard and stared at her computer monitor as if it held all of life's answers.

Maybe it did.

"Room 402, Mr. Fogarty. Take the elevator to the fourth floor and turn right." She pointed vaguely to where Dean assumed the elevators were.

"Thanks."

Dean was almost afraid to go in when he arrived at Sam's room. He had no idea what Sam's injuries were, and he really wanted to postpone the moment when he had to find out. If that made him a coward, he would cop to that willingly.

Taking a deep breath, he slowly pushed open the door and went in.

Sam was pale, his eyes closed. Dean couldn't tell if he was asleep or in a coma. There was an oxygen cannula in his nose, and the head of the bed was elevated.

His left wrist was in a cast, resting on a pillow, and his right leg – oh, crap, his right leg was a mess of splints, ropes, and pulleys.

Dean took a couple of steps closer and saw the egg-sized bruise on Sam's forehead, half-hidden by his hair.

"Jesus, Sammy, what the hell happened to you?"

Sam stirred at the sound of Dean's voice. He blinked a few times and opened his eyes, staring blearily at his brother.

"Dean," he croaked, and then his eyelids drooped closed again, his breath coming in soft snores.

Okay, no coma, then. Dean could deal with pretty much anything else.

The door opened behind him, and a portly middle-aged guy with salt-and-pepper hair came in, carrying a chart.

"Mr. Fogarty?"

Dean nodded. "Yeah, that's me. I'm Sam's brother." He gestured toward Sam. "What're his injuries?"

The guy looked taken aback for a minute at the abruptness of Dean's question, then he nodded and held out his hand.

"I'm Dr. Sullivan."

Dean shook his hand and repeated his question.

"Well, we're not clear on exactly what happened, but your brother has a mild concussion, a fractured wrist, and unfortunately, a rather bad knee injury. He tore both his ACL and his MCL, and fractured his patella."

Dean stared at him. "In English, Doc, if you wouldn't mind?"

"He tore two very important ligaments and broke his kneecap."

"Terrific," Dean muttered. "That's awesome." They'd both had their share of injuries over the years, and so had Dad, but this knee thing sounded serious. "How long does he have to stay here?" he asked, hoping to hell that "Sam Fogarty" had decent health insurance.

"We have him on the schedule first thing in the morning," Dr. Sullivan said.

"Schedule for what?" Dean had the feeling he was being dense, but he was having trouble taking his eyes off Sam's pale face long enough to concentrate.

"For surgery. To fix his knee." The doctor was talking to him as if he were a slow first-grader.

Dean nodded and tried to focus. "And then?"

"And then rehab, which he can do on an out-patient basis, probably by the end of the week. We have a wonderful rehab facility here –"

"No, that won't work," Dean said. "I live over in Woonsocket, we'll have to find something closer."

Dr. Sullivan looked dubious but then nodded. "Sure. We'll find him a place closer to home." He paused and then said, "Mr. Fogarty. I'll do everything I can to get your brother's knee back in working order, but there's a good chance it's never going to be 100% again. Just keep that in mind."

Dean nodded again. "Thanks, Doc. I'll do that." He was already thinking about what he needed to do to turn his small dining room, which right now housed about a million boxes of crap, into Sam's bedroom.

He didn't hear the doctor leave.

Pulling up an incredibly uncomfortable chair, Dean sat and stared at Sam until he woke up. He kept his mind purposefully blank, watching the hypnotizing rise and fall of Sam's chest as he breathed.

"Dean?" Sam's voice was hoarse, and Dean poured a glass of water from the pitcher and held the straw to his mouth without saying a word.

"Thanks, man," Sam said. Silence settled over them again.

"Dean?" Sam shifted in the bed, and Dean heard the sharp hiss of pain, then the soft intake of his breath as Sam tried not to react to his many, many injuries.

Dean still didn't say anything, just sat there, watching him.

"Dean, what is it? What's wrong?" Sam blinked at him blearily.

"What's wrong? I'll tell you what's wrong." Dean leaned forward in his chair, glaring. "Goddamn it, Sam, you've got enough injuries for an entire football team! What the hell? It was just a freakin' rugaru!" Dean's voice had risen in volume toward the end of his little diatribe, and he could feel that vein in his neck getting bigger.

"Dude," Sam said indignantly. "It was pretty pissed off."

Dean abruptly stood, turned around, and walked out the door.

He spent the night in the hospital parking lot, trying to get comfortable in the back seat of his car. He called Bobby and filled him in on Sam's condition.

"I'll make some calls, figure out the closest place for him to do his physical therapy. Tell that dumbass I said to make sure he don't fall out of bed and hurt himself worse."

Dean finally fell asleep just as the sun was coming up. When it slanted through the windshield and hit his eyes, he woke up again, his neck and right shoulder stiff as hell.

He grabbed a cup of coffee in the hospital lobby and headed back up to Sam's room.

They were just getting ready to wheel him off to surgery. Sam glared at him fuzzily through whatever drugs they had him on.

"Nice of you to drop by, asshole."

Dean saluted him with his coffee. "Bobby says you're a dumbass."

Their I love yous out of the way, Sam went off to get his knee fixed.



"I'm sleeping in the dining room?" Sam asked incredulously, staring at the bed situated under the window and covered with half a dozen pillows. "Wait, this is a dining room? I thought it was a junk room."

"Yes, it's a dining room," Dean said, rolling his eyes. "And now it's your bedroom."

He ushered Sam inside with an irritated wave of his hand. Sam hobbled in on his crutches, almost falling on his ass when the tip of one of them tangled with the leg of the chair Dean had shoved under the desk he'd set up for Sam to use.

"Watch it, Sam," Dean snarled. "You're going to break something. Again."

'Haha, anybody ever tell you how funny you aren't?" Sam dragged himself over to his bed and sank down on the edge with a grunt.

"I'm hilarious, and you know it," Dean retorted. He stood there, rubbing the back of his neck, feeling hollowed out with residual fear and anger.

"Dude, are you ever going to get over being mad at me?" Sam asked quietly, not looking at Dean. "I didn't get hurt on purpose, you know."

"Maybe," Dean allowed, not looking at Sam. "Give me another couple of months, and I'll consider it."

Sam sighed and tried to swing his legs up onto the bed. Dean hurried over and grabbed his right leg, lifting it carefully, holding it until Sam got his ass planted where he wanted it, then resting it gently on a pillow. "Moron," he muttered under his breath.

Sam leaned forward and tried to stuff some pillows behind his back so he could sit up. Since his left arm was still in a cast, he wasn't very successful.

"You could ask for help, you know," Dean bitched as he shoved the pillows around until Sam sank back into them with another sigh.

"You don't need to wait on me hand and foot," Sam snapped. "Stop hovering. I can take care of myself."

"Yeah, right," Dean snorted. "You sure proved that, didn't you?"

"Fuck you, Dean. Like you've never gotten hurt on a hunt before." Sam turned his head and looked resolutely out the window.

It was a sunny day, not too hot, just pleasant enough for a mild breeze to make the curtains billow softly. The window looked out on the backyard, at Dean's midget apple tree and the grass he hadn't mowed since he got the call about Sam being hurt.

Dean took a deep breath and then another one. Sam was right, but he was also completely missing the point. Dean opened his mouth, and the words that came out were not at all what he meant to say.

"You gonna quit now, Sam?" It sounded more like a plea than a question, and Dean wanted to kick his own ass.

"I don't know." Sam just kept staring out the window. He seemed pretty damned fascinated with some overgrown grass and a stunted apple tree, but it was just as well. Dean really didn't want to look at his face right now.

"Well, you be sure and let me know whenever you decide," Dean said flatly, and he turned and walked out of the room.

Sam dozed most of the afternoon. Dean brought him his pain pills and some soup and a sandwich for lunch, made sure he always had a cold glass of water or iced tea within reach, and helped him navigate to the bathroom whenever he needed to, all without either of them saying a word.

He knew for a fact that Sam had called and whined at Bobby between naps, because when Dean called to chat, not whine, thank you very much, Bobby said, "For the love of god, Dean, knock it off with the bitching. Just be glad he's alive. Maybe you could, I don't know, appreciate having him around a little."

That was a bit too close to what Dean didn't want to talk about, so he hung up on Bobby, just clicked the phone off right in his ear.

Dean made his famous hamburger-macaroni casserole for dinner, and after he pulled it out of the oven, he went to tell Sam to get his ass in the kitchen and eat it.

Sam was asleep, half-reclining on his mound of pillows. His hair was in his eyes and his mouth was slack, a string of drool connecting it to the pillow under his head.

He looked all of seven years old, at least to Dean's eyes.

Dean made up his mind right then and there that Sam was done with hunting, no matter what he said. No way was he going back out there again.

If his knee wasn't enough of a reason for Sam to stay, then the fact that Dean was going to kick his ass if he so much as mentioned leaving would be more than enough. Dean would make sure of it.

Nodding to himself, he said loudly, "Sam! Dinner!"

Sam startled awake, looking wildly around the room, his eyes narrowing when they landed on Dean.

Dean grinned at him.

"Come on, let's eat. Gotta keep your strength up for physical therapy. I've heard that shit will kick your ass."

He held out a hand to Sam. Sam just looked up at him through his messy hair for a moment, then his lips twitched, and he grabbed onto Dean's hand. Together they managed to get Sam upright, and Dean handed him his crutches. It was actually pretty entertaining to watch him try to navigate on crutches with his left arm in a cast. Being Sam, he was just stubborn enough to manage it.

"I was thinking," Sam said, as they made their slow way to the kitchen.

"Strain anything?" Dean asked.

"Asshole," Sam huffed. "No, smartass, I was thinking we should plant a garden in the backyard. Maybe grow some vegetables."

Dean snorted. "Vegetables? What are you, some kind of hippie freak?"

"No, I'd just like to not die of a heart attack from your cooking, is all," Sam said, like Dean was being the unreasonable one.

Dean pulled out one of the chairs from the kitchen table and took Sam's crutches, while Sam carefully lowered himself to the seat. Dean lifted Sam's leg and gently arranged it on a footstool he'd liberated from Bobby's house, making sure Sam's knee didn't get jostled in the process.

"You're damn lucky to have my cooking," Dean said. "My cooking is awesome."

"You keep telling yourself that, dude," Sam said, reaching for his fork. He closed his eyes blissfully around the first bite, chewing with appreciation.

Dean watched him in amusement, unable to keep the satisfied smile off his face.

Sam swallowed and opened his eyes. He looked at Dean and smiled back, shrugging.

Dean's smile got even bigger, until if felt like it took up his entire face.

Sam just laughed at him.



"Yeah?" Bobby asked.

"Yeah," Dean said.

"I guess so," Sam shrugged. Dean elbowed him in the ribs.

"Yes," Sam said. "Absolutely."