In The Flesh (A Vernacular of Scars)
R | Dean / Sam | 1,969 words - Sam listens to Dean's scars

Disclaimer: While I may admit that there are moments when I truly believe that Sam and Dean are my intellectual property, those moments only come when the doctor has shot me full of morphine. Happy drugs feed the delusion, yo. It is coolness.
betad by halfshellvenus and fiddleyoumust. With the way they rock, my rocking chair has got NOTHING on them. If this fic is awesome, half the credit goes to them.

Companion piece: Lying in ruins (Fragile in your hands)

In The Flesh (A Vernacular of Scars)

The bed dips when you kneel into it. You watch as Dean's fingers curl under the knife he keeps under his pillow. You wait in morbid curiosity to see if he will cut you open, watch as you bleed to death on him. But there is something, something that tells him that it is only you, his little brother - Sammy. His hand relaxes and Dean opens his eyes, looking at you.

The shadows from the raindrops on the window put black spots on your brother's bare chest. You don't understand it - the spots miss all the scars on his skin, choosing instead to hide the unmarred flesh.

You can see all of Dean's scars.

Your fingers reach out to touch him and the first contact opens up a flood of memories. You didn't know that you were even waiting for this, but now you realize that it's been too long.

It's simply been too long.

There's a scar on Dean's chest, just below his left pectoral muscle, and you know that it's the first scar he ever got from hunting. That it's the one that defines him. It says "I am Dean Winchester and I'm here to fuck your shit up."

The raindrops' shadows spare a few rays of light on Dean's lips. And you can see that he's smirking.

But you know it's only an illusion.

He always looks like he's smirking, because there's a very tiny scar extending the line of his lips.

"Sam, what are you doing?"

You watch Dean's lips mouth those words and the meaning only sinks in moments later. Your hand stills.

"I don't know."

The wind shifts and a branch hits the window softly. The raindrops fall down and the dark spots on Dean's chest disappear. Moonlight falls everywhere and his scars fade, blending back into his tan skin. And you didn't even have to blink.

"I don't know," you repeat.

You jerk when Dean touches your wrist and you wonder if Dean can still remember all of your scars.

*

The afternoon is lazy with heat. Slow and thick, a sweltering steam at the back of your neck.

Dean has succumbed to the heat. Your ears pick up his soft snoring as you work on your laptop, trying to figure out what it is that's been killing women in Phoenix, Arizona.

From the corner of your eye, you see Dean's boots. They look too old, as if they're simply waiting for the day that they can crumble to dust.

You jam the heels of your palms into your eyes.

Sometimes, everything looks too old.

When you open your eyes, Dean has rolled into his stomach and you are transfixed by the slopes of his back.

The knobs on Dean's spine look like a stairway to sin.

You close the laptop and go to bed. Dean's skin is warm, and sweaty with sleep. He wakes up, your forehead still pressed into that space between his shoulder blades.

Dean smells like gunpowder.

Five invisible crescent scars tell you "these are mine, from the first time he fucked me." And you remember that they tasted like salt and ash, punishment and promise.

What are you doing, Sam?

Tasting, you think. And torturing yourself.

Dean tries to raise himself but you grab his hands and still the movement. Broken knuckles when you first said goodbye. And you can see Dean punching walls, blaming himself for not being enough to make you stay.

You're not going anywhere, this time.

*

You're wrapping Dean's chest in bandages and you come across a scar on his left flank.

You don't know where it's from. And it asks, "Where were you?"

Your fingers begin to shake and it's a fight not to touch the scar, to try to ask for forgiveness. Or lash out with bitter words, accusations of why didn't Dean come with you instead.

Once, he left a message on your voicemail. You kept listening to it over and over just to hear anything from Dean even if he kept telling you Fuck you Sam, fuck you.

And now there's an unfamiliar path of too-smooth skin below Dean's ribs. You don't know where it came from either.

It whispers, "You abandoned me."

You tie off the bandages a little tighter than necessary, and Dean grunts with annoyance. You stalk towards the bathroom, all your answers still inside.

You let me go, asshole.

You let me do it.

*

There was a time when you got into an argument with your Law professor when he used the wrong Latin term and he cocked his fat hips and challenged you on what basis you had. And you almost said "I've been exorcising demons since before I knew how to walk, you fucktard."

You had your own spot in the library. Nobody tried to take it from you because you arrived at Stanford with scraped knuckles, a black eye and a puffy lip; everyone thought you were a thug.

And then one day, this girl took your place before you got there. She made herself at home, with her I-pod, her laptop, a bag of chips and her books. When you arrived at the library, you could hear the music from her earphones. She was playing Spider Solitaire on her laptop, chips were all over the desk and she was reading Nietzsche with a purpose.

She made you flip a coin for the table and you lost. So you dragged a table to her, this girl whose name was Jess, and she shared her Doritos with you and got cheesy fingerprints all over your jacket.

Your dorm had a fridge and there was food in it. You slept in a bed that didn't change every one hundred miles. You woke up to a wall instead of a window of constantly moving scenery.

Everything was normal. Everything was not Dean. Not blood. Not hunting. Not... family.

And you gave it all up.

No, it was taken from you, torn away from fingers that craved to hold a briefcase instead of a handgun.

All you wanted was something outside of rough stubble and gunmetal green eyes.

But maybe the reason you can't have anything is because you have a brother who is supposed to be everything.

You gave him up, asking the question of what would stay real if he was gone.

Four years ago, the answer was nothing.

Four years later, the answer is still the same.

*

The car hums underneath your legs and it's a lullaby. The cool night air rushing in from the window is making you drowsy. You lean your head back and you're 14 again, bouncing in excitement that you got to ride shotgun because Dad is in his truck.

The heat blurs everything beyond the windshield and Dean is blasting Black Sabbath because Dad isn't here to overrule it. Dean slams his hand on the horn as the van in front of them suddenly swerves, and he shouts "Get off my road, bitches!" and you know he's half-serious.

You laugh as Dean steps on the gas and leaves the van behind. At 14, you thought Dean was invincible, a god.

The car bounces through a pothole and you're jolted from a half-dream of memories you were ready to live again.

You look at Dean's hand on the steering wheel and you see a long slim slash of white on the back of his hand.

Gods don't scar.

With the veneer of Dean is so cool! Dean is my big brother! thrown off now, you see his flaws, the cracks beneath his impenetrable armor. You've heard the half-held breath underneath his cocky words. You've seen him bleed in every way but blood.

Dean is just human, mortal and imperfect.

Sometimes, you want to forget that.

Sometimes you wish you still could.

*

Some days, the barter is worth it.

A car for a dorm, exorcism rituals instead of test papers, a brother for everything else.

But some days, you ask Everything else for what? Scars?

When you touch your lips to Dean's throat, you're surprised to feel a scar pressing under your tongue.

The line of healed-over flesh is smooth. You remember days of playing a game of trying to remember the story of each other's scars. No rules, just a simple quiet understanding. Victories are celebrated together. Errors are easily forgiven because the tale of a scar can be told again. So that they don't forget, so that they always remember each other.

You ghost your lips over Dean's neck, nuzzling that maddeningly unfamiliar stretch of broken skin.

The game starts anew.

This time, Dean grabs your wrists. "What are you doing, Sam?" he asks again.

"Relearning," you whisper.

And quietly, quietly the scar says "At last."

*

You can map them one by one. A topographer of raised flesh, drawing with your tongue and fingers, remembering old ones and altering memory where new ones appear.

A scar on Dean's inner thigh, a bridge of sweat, soap and secrets. Because you're the only one who knows how he got it, the only one who knows its there.

Cigarette burn on his left hip, an island of smoky bars and rough pool tables.

Puncture wound to the soft curve of his armpit. A peninsula of violence, tombstones and unflown spirits.

Your fingers are well-invited travelers on the landscape of Dean's skin, tongue an old, old lover reborn.

Who else has been here?

And you want to know how many others have traced this path of broken skin. But you're so, so afraid to ask because the words might travel from the scar towards Dean's lips. And you don't want to hear him blame you, accuse you. Because you have no right to be jealous, no right to tell Dean Only for me.

But the curiosity burns against your throat. You want to know how many hands have lain against his flesh. You want to know how many tongues have tasted the salt on Dean's skin. Because you want to - you need to - make Dean forget that there were others. You want him to forget that there was anyone other than Sammy.

*

You punch Dean in the arm before you wrap his shoulder wound. He got careless, and the banshee's scratches were deep.

You wonder if it would be different if you were the one injured instead. Then you realize that Dean would probably jump in front of you and still be hurt.

Stupid brother.

The wound will leave a mark. Another patch of nerveless skin to further reinforce the unfeeling exterior of Dean Winchester. You are oddly proud that you're the only one who can truly hurt Dean, the one who can hurt him best. You did it once by leaving him and no amount of scarring can keep that pain at bay.

Sometimes, you think that the reason why scars don't have nerve endings is because people don't like to be reminded of their failures.

Yet Dean still startle-jerks when you run your tongue over the long scar on his abdomen. There's no sensation in the middle of scar tissue, but some still lingers along its edges.

It is enough to remind Dean that your tongue is there. Enough to remind Dean that he's still human. Enough to remind Dean that scars are pride but they're also hope.

What are you doing, Sam?

Coming back, you think, coming home.

Two weeks from now when these wounds fully heal, they'll say "Nothing's gonna happen to you. Because I'm Dean Winchester and I'm your fucking brother."

You take Dean's hand and press it to the bruise on your ribs where the banshee's scream knocked you into a wall. His fingers are calloused on your skin and you push them deeper, harboring the delusion that he can melt into you and hear the rhythmic sound of your heart and what it says

Your bruise will not scar, and in three days it'll probably fade. You'll have nothing to show Dean what you want to tell him now. So you push his fingers harder into your skin, ignoring the bloom of pain and you want him to know that it says I'm here now.

I'm here now.