Hey, I'm Surrender to Dreams! I currently write reader-insert fanfic for Supernatural and Stranger Things. My favorite characters are Dean Winchester and Eddie Munson, although I also like Sam Winchester and Steve Harrington, too. (First Steve fic in the making now!)
I also post on AO3! You can check me out here if you're interested.
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Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, Dean opens his big mouth, and says the wrong things, 866/25943 words
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Chapter 15 - Relinquished Chances - Dean
“Hey, go easy on her!” Dean barks when he hears your low whine as Scotty and the sheriff tie you up to an apple tree adjacent to the one he’s been strung up to. He’s never heard you so weak before. You’d always been so determined to keep a brave face when you were injured. It was an awful sign that you didn’t seem to have the energy to even muster that much.
“Haven’t you already done enough to her?” he says to the sheriff, who eyes him with distaste. “How many people have you killed, Sheriff? How much blood is on your hands?”
“We don’t kill them,” the man says, stepping back from you.
“No, but you sure cover up after. I mean, how many cars have you hidden, clothes have you buried?”
The sheriff doesn’t say anything as he walks away. The rest of them aren’t too far behind.
“I hope your apple pie is freakin’ worth it!” he shouts after them.
Dean turns his attention back to you, struggling to catch a glimpse from his spot. His neck strains outward so badly it stings. From his limited gaze, he can see that your body has slumped over, held almost entirely by the rope restraining you by your wrists. Only the shallow rise and fall of your shoulders as you breathe gives him any proof of life.
“Sweetheart?” Dean chokes. “You still with me?”
“What’s our plan?” you murmur, your voice a ghost in the air.
“I’m working on it. You just focus on staying awake for me, all right?”
“I thought you wanted me to sleep,” you laugh weakly.
“When it won’t give me a heart attack, sure, you can sleep all you want.”
“A heart attack . . .” You pause to breathe. Air rustles against your throat, like it has to fight its way down. “Can’t have that. You’re too pretty to die.”
Dean gawks. His worry drowns under pure bafflement. You’re never so straightforward.
“Wow. I’m really losing it, huh? Can’t believe I just said that,” you whisper to yourself.
You think he’s pretty. He already knew you had a thing for him, so why does you acknowledging it make him feel so—
“Now, don’t let it get to your head. I just said you’re pretty. Nothing you didn’t already know.”
“Didn’t think I was your type,” Dean says, both to keep you talking and also because he clearly can’t help himself.
“What do you mean, ‘Didn’t think I was your type?’”
He shouldn’t say it, shouldn’t dig into his own wounds like this.
He does it anyway.
“Just figured Sam was more your thing.” Maybe if you denied it, he could get over this burden in his heart. Maybe he’d believe you, even if every part of him told him otherwise.
A pause.
“You’re still on that?” you breathe.
“You two are good together. Sam needs you. And he’d take care of you.”
“Sam’s not even here.”
“But he wanted you with him, didn’t he? Surprised you didn’t go. I saw that little goodbye hug. You both were holding on pretty tight.” The bitterness is rancid on his tongue. Hadn’t he said he’d go easy on you?
Still, the memory stirs up that depraved jealousy. He remembers how hard it had been not to give up and drive off right then, with the trunk he’d left open for you exposed to the world. His hope had been fighting a losing battle until he saw you walking back in that rearview mirror. You’d chosen him, if only in that moment.
“Wait. Is that why you’ve been,” you breathe unsteadily, “so distant?” All this talking can’t be easy on you. Another reason Dean’s no good for you. Who gets into an argument with a dying girl?
He does.
“I didn’t want him to get the wrong idea about you and me.”
“The wrong idea?”
“You know. That I was competition.”
You don’t say anything for a moment, even though Dean is begging you to tell him he’s wrong. He doesn’t know if it would actually be easier for him if he heard you say the words, that you didn’t want Sam, that you never would. That you’d only ever want him.
He’s a hypocrite, really. After years of telling himself that you’d find someone else eventually, after years of banking on the idea, he was getting territorial over you when it was actually happening. Fighting it is cruel of him, when he knows that he could never provide you the same things that Sam could. But he’s a selfish man. He always has been. He’d like to tether himself to you, if it meant you could never leave him behind.
When your silence stretches on too long, he strains to glimpse your breathing in your shoulders.
“‘Cause you’re not competition, right?”
It stings to hear coming from your lips, even though it was him that pushed the words out first. But this was good, wasn’t it? If you forgot about him and started looking at other options, better options, you could have a life outside all this. Dean was never going to get out of this life, but you could. Sam could.
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, it's never easy, 1044/25943 words
A/N: Sometimes I think about how movies love to knock people out, but any amount of long term unconsciousness is a sign of severe brain damage. People aren’t just bouncing back from that.
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 14 - Rookie Mistakes - You
The morning sun blazes directly into your tired eyes when you wake up. From the intense squinting, it takes you longer than necessary to realize that Dean isn’t in the car with you, but soon enough you notice the scent of him deluding you into thinking he’s there is coming from the jacket enveloping you and not him.
You sit up straight immediately, furiously blinking away the burn in your eyes. The car is parked at the community college. Dean must have gone on without you, the bastard.
The irritation at being left behind spikes into alarm when you spot the sheriff’s patrol car parked not too far from you. This whole time you’d been thinking it was just the one town, but could it really be much bigger than you thought? Had the professor ratted Dean out?
Your hands find the pistol tucked away in the glovebox, checking the ammunition out of second nature as you step cautiously out of the car. Usually bringing a gun onto school grounds is a taboo, but it looks like school’s out anyway. There’s only a couple cars aside from the Impala and the sheriff’s.
Halfway to the front doors, a man comes stumbling through with his back to you, bent over like he’s dragging something. In his hands is Dean’s limp body.
“Put him down!” you warn, and the sheriff drops his grip on Dean’s arms as he spins around, hands already reaching for his belt before he registers the gun pointed at him. He pulls his own up.
“You wouldn’t shoot an officer,” he says snidely.
It’s true you don’t make a habit out of putting bullets in humans, but what other option did you have when he had Dean? You could make an exception, couldn’t you?
“You deserve it, don’t you? With all the things you’ve been doing in that town,” you say, adjusting your grip. The gun feels oddly heavy in your hands. Could you really kill a person? Wasn’t the whole point of this gig saving people?
“My hands are clean,” he says.
“Will they be if you shoot me?”
He shakes his head with a small laugh. “How about this? You put that gun down, and I hand over your boyfriend? We can find someone else just fine.”
“No, you can’t. You’re running out of time, aren’t you? You really want to risk waiting for another stranger to blow into town?”
“There’s always other options. We’ll do what needs to be done.”
You wonder who of the townspeople he’d choose instead of a stranger. Who ranked low enough on that totem pole? Emily?
You don’t move your gun.
“I could always put a bullet through him instead. End this right here.”
“No!”
The sheriff smiles like he’s already won. “All right. No problem. Just put the gun down.”
You shouldn’t do it. You know that. But you’ve accepted that you don’t have it in you to shoot him, and you don’t trust that he won’t hurt Dean anymore than he has.
You lower your arms barely a foot and get shot right below your shoulder. A shocked gasp sucks down your lungs, your eyes staring at the blooming red at your bicep. It’s your first time being shot. The things you’ve dealt with before have preferred more animalistic methods of injury: teeth, claws, fists, the like. Looking at your arm, you can’t seem to convince yourself that it didn’t happen to someone else. You oddly find that there’s no pain, although you know it’s sure to come.
When you raise your head back up you’re pushed onto the ground.
“Don’t worry,” the sheriff says above you. “We’ll need you alive.”
The gun in his hand comes down on your head like a hammer, and the world goes dark.
-
Dean is the only thing you can see.
The only thing you can feel is pain.
You groan aloud at the steady, throbbing ache in your arm that you’ve woken up to as Dean coos over you. His hand clasps over the side of your face with his thumb soothing along your damp forehead. There’s no adrenaline to protect you now.
“Fuck! Knock me out again, please!”
The bullet wound in your arm is held tight with a piece of gray fabric that has darkened with your blood. Your brow furrows until you find that the end of Dean’s shirt is jagged, curling up where it’s been torn or cut, and visibly a couple inches shorter, so much so that it barely reaches his beltline now.
“What the hell happened to you?”
“Sheriff,” you grumble. “I should’ve shot first.”
“Just fucking left you bleeding like this. Protect and serve, my ass. I’ll kill that son of a bitch.”
“How long have they had us down here?”
“A while. Probably not long until dinner time now.” Your mind flashes to the scarecrow's sickle. What a way to go. God, haven’t you had enough?
“You shouldn’t have left me behind,” you say, deciding to focus your energy on scolding Dean instead of lamenting over your looming death.
“I know, I know. I just—You haven’t been sleeping well, and you looked so—But we should’ve been together. I should’ve been there.” His hand grips your shoulder on your good side.
“Did you at least figure out how to kill it?” Not that you’d get the chance to try.
“Yeah, thing’s a Vanir, a Norse god. Its power comes from a sacred tree.”
“And it lives in an orchard,” you scoff. “Needle in a haystack.”
“Hey, we’ll find it. We’ll burn down every single one of those trees if we have to.”
“If we get out of this,” you say, looking around at the small cellar you’re trapped in. There’s definitely no way out of here. If there was, Dean would’ve found it by now.
“We will.”
“I’m doing pretty bad here, Dean,” you whisper, although it goes without mentioning. Even lifting your head to speak to him feels like trudging through mud. Dean’s jerryrigged bandage is only doing so much to staunch the bleeding.
“We will.” His voice shakes. You wonder if he actually believes the words himself.
The cellar door opens with a whine, revealing your four favorite people. The woman, Stacy, speaks first.
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, you save the couple, Sam and Dean make amends, 852/25943 words
A/N: Jensen's little waddle before he turns in this GIF makes me giggle.
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 13 - Unsevered Ties - Dean
The ugly bastard comes for the couple, all right. Just like the two of you suspected.
Dean blasts the thing straight through the chest, but it doesn’t stop staggering after the couple. Too much to hope that he could kill it with a couple shotgun shells, he guesses. You get a beautiful shot through the scarecrow’s head with your pistol. The body keeps pushing forward as the head jerks back.
“It’s not stopping, Dean,” you warn, already taking steps backward. He nods and begins to run with you. With no other plans, both of you send a couple more shots through the thing to no avail. He sees the couple lingering too close for comfort and shouts, “Go! Go!”
Dean is two measured steps behind you when you turn around in the clearing and your eyes widen. He spins around, ready to slam the scarecrow with the butt of his gun if he has to, only to find nothing behind him.
“Thank fuck for that,” you murmur, breathing heavily.
“What—what the hell was that?” the boyfriend of the almost-scarecrow-dinner couple sputters through gasps for breath.
“Don’t ask,” Dean says.
“We’ve got to get you two out of here,” you say to the couple, ushering them to their car.
“But the car’s busted,” the girlfriend says.
“I’ll take a look.” Dean hands over his shotgun to you.
“He really is good with cars,” you say with a smile before jogging the way back to the Impala.
“Who are you people?” the guy asks.
“I think the less you two know the better,” Dean laughs. “But we take care of stuff like that.”
“Thank you,” the girl says.
“It’s nothing,” Dean replies, though his smile only grows wider. “Now, let’s take a look at what good old Harley did to your car.”
It doesn’t take long for Dean to find the issue, fix it, and send the happy, though frazzled, couple on their way. Still, by the time he slumps back into the Impala, he finds you knocked out in the passenger seat. You’re tucked into the bench at an odd angle, but you must be comfortable enough since your breathing is smooth and deep. He smiles and shrugs off his jacket to lay across your body before he pulls onto the road.
He really should settle in himself, climb into the backseat or, if he’s selfish, take up the other side of the front seat so he can share a stolen space with you. He hasn’t had a proper sleep in over twenty-four hours, but for some reason he knows that if he laid down now, he wouldn’t be able to keep his eyes shut.
It’s around five minutes in that he finally bites the bullet and calls Sam. The way the tension instantly falls from Dean’s shoulders after hearing his brother’s voice on the line tells him just how much he’s missed him.
Dean talks to Sam about the case—because that’s easier than talking about how they left things—mentioning the theories the two of you have come up with and your next steps with the professor. The conversation naturally drifts off from there. That damn elephant in the room.
“Actually, uh—” he starts, wincing. “I want you to know . . . I mean, don’t think . . .” Squeezing out the words is like willingly holding his hand to a hot stove.
“Yeah. I’m sorry, too,” Sam says, thankfully picking up what Dean was implying.
“Sam. You were right. You gotta do your own thing. You gotta live your own life.”
“Are you serious?”
“You’ve always known what you want, and you go after it. You stand up to Dad, and you always have. Hell, I wish—Anyway . . . I admire that about you. I’m proud of you, Sammy.”
“I don’t even know what to say.”
“Say you’ll take care of yourself.”
“I will.”
“Call me when you find Dad,” he adds, preparing to hang up the phone.
“Okay. Uhm, Dean,” Sam starts, pausing to listen for if he’s still on the line.
“Yeah?”
“How is she?”
It’s like a cold bucket of water down his back. The phone call had been going so well.
The thing is, Dean was starting to get a little comfortable again, with Sam gone. Of course, he missed his little brother. But without him, it felt a little like how things used to be, back when it was just the two of you, us against the world. Back before the idea of you and Sam lodged in his brain and screwed him and everything else up.
Sam’s question reminds Dean that this new connection hasn’t been severed from the distance, and it brings back the clawing in his chest.
“She’s good,” Dean says simply.
“Good,” Sam repeats. “That’s good.” There’s silence for a moment.
“Can I talk to her?”
No.
“She’s sleeping right now.”
“Oh. That’s good. She needs it,” Sam says, and Dean can hear the disappointment even behind the brave front. “Well. Bye, Dean.”
“Bye.”
His cell is heavy in his hands as he steals a glance at you. When Sam was done in California, would he come back for you?
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, another couple blows through town, 986/25943 words
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 12 - Unsuspecting Victims - You
You guess it would’ve been too much to ask for you and Dean to be the only option the town would have for their plans. Oh, how simple it would have been if when you had come back in town to fill up on gas—because, of course, you didn’t have enough to make it to the next town after making such a quick escape unprepared—you didn’t find a naive couple eating up the very plan that had been used on you and Dean.
Scotty doesn’t seem too pleased to see the two of you blow into his little café as he’s dropping off a free pie for the couple, a stark contrast from how friendly he’d been the first time you saw him. You’ve certainly ended up on the shit list.
“Oh, hey, Scotty,” Dean greets, ignoring the irritated look on the man’s face. “Can I get a coffee, black? Oh, and some of that pie, too, while you’re at it.” You follow him as he sits down at the table nearest to the couple. “How ya doin’? Just passing through?”
“Road trip,” the girl nods.
“Us, too,” you smile. Dean watches as Scotty glides by.
“I’m sure these people want to eat in peace,” he says to Dean.
“Just a little friendly conversation,” Dean says, eyes still on Scotty as he walks away again. “Oh, and that coffee, too, man. Thanks.” You give Dean a side glance. The antagonizing isn’t going to do you any favors.
“So, what brings you two into town?” you ask the couple. “Didn’t realize this was such a popular stop.”
“Oh, we just stopped for gas. And, uh, the guy at the gas station saved our lives,” the girl says.
“Is that right?” Dean hums.
“Yeah, one of our brake lines was leaking. We had no idea. He was fixing it for us,” her boyfriend adds. You and Dean share a look.
“What a coincidence,” you murmur.
The girl’s brow furrows. “Huh?”
You shake your head dismissively. “We had some car troubles of our own when we came in, but John here had us up and running again in no time.” You squeeze Dean’s hand. It twitches in your grip, but he doesn’t pull away. The lapse in composure lingers in your mind even when you eventually remove your hand from his.
“How long did he give you?” Dean asks.
“Sundown,” the guy says.
“Really. To fix a brake line?”
“Shouldn’t take that long by a mile,” you add. “Even I could get it done faster than that, and I don’t know half as much about cars as John does.” The girl frowns softly, and you think maybe you’re getting somewhere.
“I could fix it up for you, have you up and running in about an hour. I wouldn’t charge you anything,” Dean says. Somehow, you get an odd sense of deja vu. It was almost like he’d stepped into Harley’s shoes.
“You know, thanks a lot, John, but I think we’d rather have a mechanic do it,” the girl says. You have to fight a frustrated sigh.
“Sure. I know,” Dean pulls back. “You know, it’s just that these roads . . . They’re not real safe at night.”
“I’m sorry?”
“I know it sounds strange, but, uh—you might be in danger.”
You throw your hand over Dean’s arm as the boyfriend inflates in annoyance. You speak quickly to cut him off before he can shut Dean down. “Baby, don’t scare them.” All eyes turn to you, but you focus on the couple. “It’s just, our friends went missing around here, about the same time last year. They were just like you two, road trippers, had some car trouble that held them up in some middle-of-nowhere town, and then we never heard from them again.”
“They really went missing?” the girl asks.
You gesture to Dean, who pulls out the missing persons fliers from his pocket. “We’ve been trying to find out what happened,” he explains as the couple examines the papers.
The girl glances over at her boyfriend. “Maybe, we should let them look at it. I’ve heard about things like this.” You smile warmly, hoping it makes you seem trustworthy.
The bell above the door jingles, stealing your attention and your smile. A man in a sheriff’s uniform walks in, and Scotty reappears from the back to speak low in his ear. When their eyes fall on you and Dean, you both share a tense look.
The sheriff saunters over to your table. “I’d like a word, please. Both of you.”
“Is there a problem?” you ask.
“I’m hoping we might be able to avoid one.”
You both begrudgingly file out of the café and let the sheriff escort you out of town without a word, at least until you get into the car, that is.
“It can never be fucking easy, can it?” Dean says.
You eye the patrol car through the rear window. “It is the whole fucking town. God, I hate being right all the time.”
“I hate it, too. Gives you such an ego,” Dean laughs. You shove his arm.
“So, we’re staking out the orchard tonight, right? That couple is going to wind up there for sure.”
Dean nods and then scoffs. “Not much else we can do anyway. Clearly, we’re not welcome here.”
“We don’t even know if this thing can be killed,” you huff, falling back in the seat. “Why couldn’t they have shown up after we talked to that professor?”
“Like I said, never easy. God, this day is really not going my way.”
“Might help your mood if you gave someone a call,” you say coyly. Dean looks unamused.
“Just saying,” you add with a shrug.
He sighs. “I’ll call him.”
You smile.
“When I feel like it.”
He grins when you scoff and turn your face toward the window, muttering, “You’re so fucking stubborn sometimes.”
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, things are strange in Burkitsville, 1182/25943 words
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 11 - Odd People - You
Harley and his wife, Stacy, were just about as helpful as Scotty, although thanks to Emily you at least had the direction they were heading. The other towns hadn’t even given you that much.
“Ah, what the hell?” Dean groans, rushing over to the Impala. He crouches down to examine a small puddle forming around one of the wheels.
“What’s wrong?”
He huffs. “Must be the brake line, but I don’t understand how—”
“Car troubles?”
You nearly leap out of your skin at Harley’s voice right over your shoulder.
Dean looks away from the puddle to meet Harley’s gaze, a furrow in his brow that reads to you more like wariness than frustration. He glances at you as he says, “Yeah.” You pick up on his implication immediately, although Harley seems none the wiser to Dean’s suspicions.
“I could take a look at it for you.”
“No, thanks. I can handle it,” Dean says, standing to walk to the trunk where you know his toolbox is tucked away beside the other box that’s coated in sigils and filled with weapons.
“He’s real touchy about his car,” you comment, taking a couple steps away from Harley so your back is to the Impala instead of him. “Doesn’t even let me drive it.”
Not true, at least for the last part. Dean taught you how to drive in that car after stealing it from his dad a couple times. Since John taught him much too young, Dean was basically an expert by the time you turned fifteen.
“I promise it’ll be in good hands,” Harley insists, which spurs an irritated twitch in Dean’s brow that he fails to cool. “I’m the best mechanic this town has to offer.”
You can see the smartass comment Dean swallows down in the way his mouth twists before he lets out a rough, “I’m not too bad either.”
“Has to be to own a classic,” you add.
“Have to be,” Dean smiles.
“Now, I just wouldn’t feel right letting you leave here without taking a look. How about this? I’ll fix her up free of charge. Get you out of here before sundown,” Harley says.
Sundown? To fix a brake line?
You imagine Dean’s thinking the same thing. His eyes are firm as he speaks through a tight, practiced smile. “Well, I tell you what, Harley, you drive a hard bargain. But I’m afraid I’m going to have to pass.”
Harley’s accommodating smile falls. “I’m sorry to hear that. Well, I’ll be praying for the both of you,” he says, the words feeling like an omen as he turns to head back into the store. Both of you watch him until he disappears through the door, and you promptly rush Dean.
“What the hell was that?” you whisper.
“Nothing good. I have a feeling we’re right where we need to be,” he says, watching over your shoulder as if Harley might show up again with a gun pulled if he turned away.
“Wonder if the last couple was having ‘car troubles,’” you scoff.
Dean shakes his head, popping open the truck to lug out his toolbox and the jack. “I don’t know. But I do know that man is going to pay for putting hands on my car.”
-
It takes Dean less than an hour to fix the brake line, especially when it’s revealed to be a shoddy tampering job, although both of you had been expecting it anyway.
It takes less than a minute for him to burn his way out of the parking lot.
“Fucking son of a bitch,” he grumbles under his breath and continues with quiet insults too muted to hear over the music.
You wait until he stops muttering to ask, “Where are we heading?”
“I don’t know. It’s gotta be something to do with Harley . . . But seems like Scotty was in on it, too! ‘Great mechanic,’ my ass.”
“I’m not sure it’s just the two of them at this point. What if it’s the whole town? You mean to tell me nobody but that Emily girl is concerned about all these disappearances?”
“Either way, being in town is bad news until we figure out exactly what’s going on with these people."
“You think the interstate story was a lie? To throw us off the trail?”
He shrugs, though he’s turning onto the interstate anyway. “Won’t hurt to give it a look. Better than staying in town. I feel like I could punch someone’s lights out right now, touching my car.”
“Long as you keep those fists away from me, you can punch out whoever you like.”
He laughs then, shaking his head. The ease of it feels like coming home. When was the last time you made him laugh like that?
The car speeds down the road while you watch the scenery as it blows by. You admire a neat, little orchard out the window, until the whining sound of the EMF catches both of your attentions. The device is flashing like a storm when you pull it from Dean’s bag in the backseat.
“Pull over,” you murmur, though Dean doesn’t need the instruction. The car is already sliding off to the side as you speak, the EMF in your hand only getting more irate.
-
“Dude, you fugly.”
You snort a laugh, shaking your head as you inspect the EMF. It’s going haywire now that you’re only feet from the freaky scarecrow posted in the middle of the orchard. You shut the thing off and tuck it into your back pocket, noticing Dean has moved to pick up a ladder. He climbs up all close and personal with the figure and pulls out one of the fliers from his pocket, comparing it with something on the other side of the scarecrow that you can’t see with him blocking your view.
“Nice tat,” he says and tucks away the paper. He jumps smoothly down from the ladder and turns to you. “Thing has Vince’s tattoo.”
“Disgusting,” you wince, eyeing the sickle in the scarecrow’s hand and picturing it flaying a section of poor Vince’s skin to use for its own. “So, the town’s sacrificing couples to this thing? For what? Some fertility ritual?”
Dean considers for a moment, nodding. “That tracks with the annual cycle of the disappearances, the fact that it’s only couples. Must be some sort of god.”
“Must hunt at night, too. Otherwise, we’d be on the chopping block right now. Or, I guess the altar?” You glance warily at the scarecrow, but it remains frozen on its post.
“Sundown,” he murmurs in agreement. It perfectly explains the odd allotment of time Harley had given to fix the tampered brake line.
“Pretty flawless plan. Who would question that hospitality?”
How many couples have they trapped here with their false smiles and false stories? How long had this been going on for?
“But not good enough to fool us, right?” Dean grins, holding out his fist. You match his smile, bumping your own knuckles against his.
“Yeah, they’ll need to think of something much better to take us down.”
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, you and Dean look into the missing couples case, 1012/25943 words
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 10 - Old Friends - Dean
“You’ve looked at your phone in every town we’ve stopped in. Just call him.”
Dean looks up at you, flustered at being caught eyeing Sam’s contact in his phone. He stuffs it into his pocket and lugs himself out of the car.
“He doesn’t hate you, you know.”
“Look, I don’t want to hear another word about Sam from you.” His voice is firmer than he means for it to be, but he can’t help it with the irritation that’s been gnawing at him ever since Sam ran out on him, again. He didn’t need any reminders that you were missing Sam, too. It was hard enough having to fight the image of you tucked into his brother’s arms as you’d said your goodbyes.
Dean’s eyes zero in on a man sitting alone on a porch. He storms forward, glancing at the sign above the man’s head that reads, “Scotty’s Café.”
“Damn. I was just saying,” you huff, chasing after him.
“Let me guess,” Dean says to the man, gesturing to the sign, “Scotty.”
“Yep,” he says, perking up when he spots you walking up next to Dean.
“Hi. My name’s John Bonham.”
“Isn’t that the drummer for Led Zeppelin?”
“Wow. Good. Classic rock fan.”
“Nice to meet you, John,” Scotty says, standing to hold out his hand for Dean to shake. He then turns to you, hand outstretched. “Mrs. Bonham, I presume?”
“Oh, no. We’re not—” you start, quick to correct the man, although you catch yourself before finishing with the implied together.
Wrong brother, Scotty. Obviously, there was no world where you and Dean could be together.
“We’re not married,” you say instead, reaching out with your own hand. “I’m Kelly Rowland until John bites the bullet and proposes.” You join in to laugh conspiratorially with Scotty as he shakes your hand.
“Well, tell him to hurry up. Gotta lock down a woman like you while you’ve got the chance.”
“Why thank you. Hear that, John?” Dean doesn’t really know what to do with his face when you bump his arm with yours.
“What can I do for such a lovely couple?” Scotty smiles.
Dean shakes his head, resetting his thoughts like an Etch A Sketch. He removes the two pieces of paper tucked into his pocket, Holly and Vince’s missing persons flyers. “We were wondering if, uh, you’d seen these people by chance.”
Scotty skims over the papers, not really giving them much attention, a red flag already. “Not a clue. Who are they?”
His speech is well practiced after the first couple towns the two of you have checked over. “Friends of ours. They went missing about a year ago. They passed through somewhere around here, and we’ve already asked around Scottsburg and Salem—”
“Sorry, son,” Scotty says, holding the flyers back out for Dean. “I haven’t seen ‘em, but I tell you what if anybody had, it would’ve been ole Harley at the general store. We don’t get many strangers around here, but if we do it’s people stopping there for gas. Great mechanic, too, Harley is.”
“Well, thanks, Scotty. We’ll head there next. I need to fill up anyway,” Dean says, storing the papers safely where they belong.
“You two don’t want to come in for something to eat? Maybe some pie? We’re famous for our apples,” Scotty says just as the two of you turn back for the car.
“You do love apple pie,” you tease.
“Maybe later,” Dean says to Scotty. “Thanks.”
“See you around, Scotty,” you call with a wave.
“Any time!”
“He’s nice,” you say when the two of you duck back into the Impala. “Maybe too nice?”
“Too nice?” The engine roars to life, and Dean pulls off onto the road again.
“He seemed really excited when he thought I was your wife. And it is only couples that are going missing.”
“So, that’s what that proposal shit was about? Pretend we’re together, so we might be the next target? Real bright.”
“Don’t get all pissy with me. Could be fun, and it’s not like we haven’t done it before.” And each time you had pretended to be a couple for case it had been torture, like being handed a beer and being forbidden to drink it.
“Right,” Dean huffs. “‘Fun.’”
“Okay, what’s your problem?”
“I don’t have a problem.”
“Dean, you’ve been treating me like shit for what feels like months.”
“Have not.” Had he?
“You hardly talk to me anymore. We used to be close. I mean, you used to be my best friend.”
Sure, he’d kept you at a further distance than usual, a weak attempt to get out of the splash zone of the impending collision between you and his brother. He hadn’t been treating you like shit, though.
Well . . .
Dean thinks over the last couple of seconds. He had been harsh, redirecting his anger at the situation to you. Knowing him, he’d probably done the same thing a couple times over, even though the last thing he wanted to do was get gruff with you and remind you of all the reasons you shouldn’t keep someone like him around. He needed to be better about that.
“We are. Friends.”
“Right. So, then, why are you acting like this? Is it because of Sam?”
More than you know.
Well, at the very least, maybe things would go back to normal with Sam doing his own thing now. Back to just you and him against the world. Even so, he can’t help but miss the little brat. It would be better if Dean could have both of you with him, as a complete picture instead of a photo ripped into sections.
“Yeah,” he says, not elaborating. He pulls up next to a pump at Jorgeson General Store.
“You should really call him,” you say, soft as ever.
“Sammy’s got his own life. He should live it how he wants.” He shuts off the car and climbs out.
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, Sam and Dean head down different paths, 1224/25943 words
A/N: Here's where we get some actual plot. The next chapters will focus on the Scarecrow plot.
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 9 - Regretful Words - You
APRIL
The random phone call from John after months of radio silence is no less surreal the closer you get to Indiana. It left a heavy tension between the two boys sitting on the bench in front of the Impala. For you, having an unobstructed view from the back, it’s like watching a car crash in slow motion.
Sam grips the steering wheel periodically, wringing it in his hand so tightly it could crumble. Usually, he’s a little more considerate when he’s given the chance to drive, but his anger seeps through him and into the vehicle. You’re speeding down the highway so fast the scenery is a blur through the window. Dean normally would’ve said something by now about Sam’s recklessness, but his jaw has been firmly set the whole ride, as though he’s choking back his own thoughts from rolling over his tongue.
The sight has raised your blood pressure so much that you decide to lay down in the back seat and try to force yourself to catch up on the sleep you missed when the phone call from John wreaked havoc on the little sliver of peace that had formed between the three of you. Though you do manage to drift off, the sky is just as dark like no time passed at all between when you closed your eyes and when the sensation of the Impala coming to a stop beneath you stirs you awake again.
The boys are speaking in unhushed tones when you blink open your bleary eyes, and not pleasantly.
“What are you doing?” Dean asks.
“We’re not going to Indiana,” Sam replies.
“We’re not?”
“No. We’re going to California. Dad called from a payphone. Sacramento area code.”
“Sam,” you say at the same time Dean does. You pull yourself up from the bench, both brothers turning to face you with a shock in their eyes like they’d forgotten you were in the car with them. “Sacramento is halfway across the country. There’s no telling if John’ll be there by the time we make it to California.”
“He’ll be there,” Sam says. “It’s no coincidence that he’s closing in on the thing—the demon that killed Mom and Jess in California. And we’ve gotta be there when he does. We’ve gotta help.”
“Dad doesn’t want our help,” Dean says.
You try to be less harsh than him when you say, “If John wanted us to find him, we would’ve by now.”
“I don’t care.”
“He’s given us an order,” Dean barks. You bite your cheek to keep from scoffing at that.
“I don’t care. We don’t always have to do what he says.”
“Sam, Dad is asking us to work jobs, to save lives. It’s important.”
“Alright. I understand. Believe me, I understand. But I’m talking one week here, man. To get answers. To get revenge.”
The last addition lodges in your chest, digging up an image of Sam burning on a ceiling. “Revenge that could get you killed Sam. There’s a reason John doesn’t want us to find him. This thing is dangerous. You know it’s dangerous.” More intimately than you ever could. You don’t go as far as to mention Jess’s name, but you don’t have to when she’s so acutely set in his mind.
He clenches his jaw, shaking his head as he tries to keep his anger under control.
“Look, I know how you feel,” Dean says, soothing his own tone as he picks up on Sam’s limit breaking.
“Do you? How old were you when Mom died? Four? Jess died six months ago. How the hell would you know how I feel?”
“Sam . . .” you whisper. Now was not the time to place value on each other’s grief.
“Dad said it wasn’t safe,” Dean insists. “For any of us. I mean, he obviously knows something that we don’t, so if he says to stay away, we stay away.”
“I don’t understand the blind faith you have in the man. I mean, it’s like you don’t even question him.”
“Yeah, it’s called being a good son!”
“Dean!” you scold, but he ignores you, following suit after Sam gets out of the car. You climb out after them as Sam begins pulling stuff out of the trunk.
“You’re a selfish bastard, you know that?” Dean says. “You just do whatever you want. Don’t care what anybody thinks. It’s all what Sam wants, what Sam needs.”
“That’s what you really think?”
“Yes, it is.”
“Well, then this selfish bastard is going to California.” He throws his bag over his shoulder and turns away.
You catch his arm in your hand. “Sam, you can’t walk to California!”
“He’s not serious,” Dean scoffs.
“I am serious,” Sam seethes with a scowl at his brother.
He turns to you with those big, round eyes that everyone’s powerless against. It’s like pouring warm water on a resolve made of sugar. “Let me go.”
You loose him from your grip, and he starts walking off again. Dean huffs.
“It’s the middle of the night!” he says, but Sam doesn’t stop walking. “Hey, I’m taking off. I will leave your ass, you hear me?”
Sam spins around, stretching out his arms. “That’s what I want you to do.”
“Dean. He’s your brother.”
“He’s a pain in my ass is what he is. Goodbye, Sam.” Dean storms back to the car, slamming the door behind him. The Impala roars to life and you half-expect it to drive off without you, but it idles with the engine rumbling angrily. When you turn back, Sam is looking at you.
“You could come with me,” Sam says.
“What? Sam, I can’t . . .”
“Why not?”
You don’t dare tell him the truth, that it will always be Dean above anything else, so instead you play it safe.
“Someone’s gotta keep your brother from falling apart. He’s a mess without you.”
Your lips purse at the ache in your heart as you close the gap between you to bring Sam into your arms. He fits differently than he used to, when you could tuck his face into your stomach and hide him from the world. You can’t help but miss that.
“Promise me you’ll take care of yourself?” you murmur into his chest.
“I’m not a kid anymore,” he breathes into your hair.
“I know that, but you’ll always be my sweet, little Sammy.” You squeeze tighter around him.
“Don’t.”
“Oh, you love it.”
He huffs, the eye roll audible even tucked so deeply into his embrace. You pull away to catch his gaze.
“You can always call. Always. I don’t want a repeat of Stanford.”
His eyes dart away. “I’m sorry about that.”
You shake your head, squeezing his arm, which is bigger than you’d realized. He really has changed so much. “Just call, alright? Don’t make me worry about you more than I have to.”
“Okay. I’ll call.”
“Goodbye, Sam.”
“Goodbye.”
When you turn back, you notice that Dean left the trunk open. Your brow furrows, but you shut it without a word before walking around to the passenger side. You spare one final glance at Sam’s back, hoping it won’t be the last time, and duck into the front seat.
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, Sam dreams of good and bad, 699/25943 words
A/N: Our first Sam chapter! My honey, my baby.
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 8 - Begging Forgiveness - Sam
MARCH
Each time Sam wakes up these days, it’s a gamble as to how it happens. Sometimes it’s a fit of screams. Sometimes it’s Jess’s name on his lips. Sometimes it’s a simple opening of his eyes.
Tonight, he wakes with a gasp, sharp but mercifully quiet. It’s followed by momentary disorientation as he remembers where he is, some motel bed in Missouri. He misses the days he would wake up in a home, warm and familiar with memories tucked into every corner. Now, every place he sleeps is impersonal, more function than feeling.
Waking up this way is nowhere near as peaceful as a day without nightmares, but the gasp saves him from the hot shame of disturbing you and Dean. It spares him from seeing that pained look on your face before you once more give up your own rest to soothe him back to sleep. For that, he’s grateful, even though the lingering image of Jess on the ceiling is burned into his eyelids, especially so since the darkness of the motel room does nothing to challenge it.
His gaze flicks to your sleeping figure beside him, shadowed with night and barely visible because of it, but he can see well enough to determine that your breathing hasn’t been disturbed from the sudden cut in his own. Your shoulders continue their small, rhythmic movements. It’s like watching waves lapping at the beach.
Seeing you so peaceful is a relief like no other, almost like he might be able to claim that peace for himself just by watching you. He wishes you were turned toward him instead of curled up on your side facing the empty space between the two motel beds. Seeing the calm on your face would be the final blessing.
When he finds himself smiling in the dark at your sleeping form, Sam realizes that he’s being a total creep. Without thinking, he flicks his attention back to the empty air in front of him, only for his heart to spike when his eyes land on the ceiling. With a shuddering breath, he turns over on his side, facing you fully without a moment’s consideration for the action even though he could’ve just as easily faced the wall. You would forgive him for the discretion.
That was something about you, how you never looked at him strangely. Like he was weird. Like he was more trouble than he was worth. That was a kindness he rarely found outside of his family, especially since he couldn’t truly be himself with normal people, people who didn’t know the things he knew. The closest he’d ever gotten was Jess, but he’d been keeping things from her, too.
Look where that got him.
He wouldn’t blame you if you did retract that forgiveness at some point. In the few months that he’s had you back in his life, he’s already taken so much from you, with nothing to give in return. He was little more than a leech on your skin, an abhorrent nuisance of a creature.
But still, you never faltered. You looked at him as though you understood, even though he didn’t quite understand himself. You soothed his soul, even though it must be draining yours. And you smiled through it all, a small ray of light in a dim world.
It made him believe he could be forgiven after all, for the evil that he was.
Sam wonders if he told you the truth, about Jess’s death and how he had seen it coming, would you still look at him with that same kindness in your eyes. Would you still see the good in him? Whatever good there was left in him?
He’d like to think you would. You’d find something in him that was worth saving.
Sam slides closer to you, not enough to touch because he knows what his touch can do to people. He leaves that barrier intact. He only gets close enough for your comforting scent to envelop him, so he can pretend you’re holding him as he drifts back to sleep.
And even though you’re fast asleep and facing away from him, Sam swears he feels watchful eyes tracking his movements.
Next Chapter
Surrender to Dreams Taglist: @vampire-kissi3s
Supernatural Taglist: @mrrayjay, @timebomb1101, @saaucie
Dean Winchester Taglist: @itzpixiebabe, @whyyouegg, @megthedreamer21
Fic Taglist: @chxrrybomb22, @momoloverr
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, Dean pushes you along, 945/25943 words
A/N: I've decided to post three chapters a week when there's a Sam chapter. Also, YAY I finally finished.
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 7 - Reluctant Persuasions - Dean
FEBRUARY
“What’s our chances of getting a peek of the Grand Canyon while we’re in Arizona?”
The sky is so dark that Dean wouldn’t be able to see your expression if not for the city lights of Tulsa bouncing off your skin. He glances away from the road to catch the “innocent” look on your face and laughs. You looked like a kid begging for chocolate before bedtime.
“Shouldn’t you be sleeping?”
“If you insist on being an idiot and driving all day and night without stopping at a motel, I’m going to stay awake in solidarity. Somebody’s gotta make sure you don’t pass out.”
Dean shakes his head. “So, you’re keeping yourself awake by daydreaming about national parks?”
“Come on,” you whine in a soft tone, still careful of Sam’s sleeping form in the backseat even as you plead. “I’ve always wanted to go, and it’s the perfect weather for it. Finally starting to warm up. God, I hate winter.” You huff in irritation, and Dean fights the smile forming on his face. You did always seem the most yourself when the sun was at its strongest, vibrant and happy like a sunflower.
Okay, Shakespeare. Ease up on the romantic metaphors.
“Bisbee is on the exact opposite side of Arizona as the Grand Canyon,” Dean notes.
He can see the dramatic roll of your eyes even while keeping his focus on the road. “When have you ever shied from a long drive? We’re already driving two days to get there. What’s another six hours?”
“We can go to the Grand Canyon. We can do whatever you want.”
“Really?” Your voice peaks in excitement.
You still haven’t picked up the fact that he’d give anything to see you happy.
The urge to see that hopeful look on your face outweighs his diligent watch on the road. When Dean sees how your wide eyes sparkle with street lights, he wants to tell you outright that he’d do anything for you, but he simply shrugs and says, “Sure.”
“Dean! Thank you!” you exclaim, going to reach for him until you realize how loud you’d been. Dean feels the almost touch like a burn as your face flicks to Sam in the backseat. You watch his brother until you’re satisfied by the undisturbed rhythm in the rise and fall of his chest.
“He’s doing better,” you murmur as you settle back into your seat. His promise and your almost touch lies dead between you.
“All because of you,” Dean says.
“It could just be the time. It’s been, what, almost four months now?”
“It’s you,” he says again, hand wringing the steering wheel as he continues, forcing the words out. “You two have been getting pretty close. Guess that crush ain’t so dead and buried after all.”
It’s silent except for the music playing low on the radio as you take in his implication.
“It’s not like that. Sam’s got a long way to go before he’s ready to move on after Jess. The nightmares are better, but they’re far from gone.” Something sickening settles in his gut when you center your defense around Sam’s feelings instead of yours. He clenches the wheel tighter.
“A long way to go doesn’t mean it’ll never happen. Like you said, four months.”
“Four months is not enough time to get over losing someone like that.”
“I didn’t say anything about ‘getting over.’ I can’t imagine he’ll ever be over Jess, but that doesn’t mean he won’t be ready for someone else. Maybe not now, but at some point.”
“And that someone else just has to be me?”
“I know my brother. And I know you.”
“You don’t know shit.”
“I’ve seen how he looks at you, how he relies on you. And don’t tell me you haven’t considered it. I’ve seen how you look at him, too.”
He’d thought those soft eyes were reserved just for him.
“Dean. You better stop right now before you actually piss me off with how wrong you are.”
“Okay. Okay. I’ll shut up.”
“Thank you.”
The music rises back up between you.
“It’s just—”
“Dean.”
“He deserves someone like you.” More than Dean does. Sam had always been the better brother. “That’s all.”
Dean can hear you thinking. He only wishes he could decipher it.
“Someone like me?”
“Yeah.”
“What does that mean exactly?”
So, now you want him to talk.
“You know. Someone who doesn’t disappear. Someone who’ll stick around when times get tough. Someone who knows how to make you smile, even when you’re hurting. Someone good.” Too good for me. “Sam deserves someone good. He needs a little good in his life, after losing Jess.”
He ignores the burn from your gaze on him and is thankful for the veil of night that’s fallen over the Impala after leaving the city. He swears his ears are on fire. This feeling is exactly why he avoids stupid heart-to-hearts.
“Dean.”
He doesn’t look. His heartrate spikes at the thought of it.
“What?” he grunts.
A grumbling in the backseat halts whatever questioning you were liable to launch yourself into. Sam slowly sits up in the rearview, rubbing his eyes.
“What time is it?” he mumbles.
“Well, good morning, sleeping beauty,” Dean chimes, thankful for the interruption.
“It’s almost midnight,” you answer, angling your body to face Sam better.
Sam sets his arms on the backrest between you and Dean. “We stopping anywhere? Or are we just driving until Dean passes out on the highway?”
You laugh, and for some reason it feels wrong.
“You still planning on staying awake in ‘solidarity?’” Dean asks you.
“One hundred percent.”
“We’ll stop at the next motel we see.”
Next Chapter
Surrender to Dreams Taglist: @vampire-kissi3s
Supernatural Taglist: @mrrayjay, @timebomb1101, @saaucie
Dean Winchester Taglist: @itzpixiebabe, @whyyouegg, @megthedreamer21
Fic Taglist: @chxrrybomb22, @momoloverr
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, Sam returns the favor, 893/25943 words
A/N: Working on what should be the last chapter (unless I do an epilgoue) and I have the worst writer's block
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 6 - Steady Hands - You
There’s a crick in your neck when you finally wake enveloped by a familiar scent, leather and woodsy cologne. Your body instinctively stretches out to provide some release to your stiff muscles until you register the weight in your lap. Sam’s head rests on your thigh, and his arms are wrapped tightly around your legs, like you’re his personal teddy bear.
You hadn’t intended to fall asleep this way but have to admit that you’ve been just as tired as he has. Being such a light sleeper, you’ve been victim to Sam’s nightmares in your own way, waking at the slightest sound from his lips like a mother for her newborn. Pretty quickly you realize this is the first night that you’ve managed to sleep through until morning, so it must be the same for him.
You decide to stay in place instead of disturbing his much-needed sleep. Your hand raises to massage the ache in your neck but gets caught in the heavy fabric cloaking your arms. Dean’s jacket. It explains the comforting smell of home you woke up to.
A glance around the room falls short of finding him. If it weren’t for the evidence of him on your body, you would’ve assumed he didn’t come back last night. The image of the woman he’d chosen resurfaces like a bitter aftertaste. Too bad she didn’t know Dean wasn’t one to linger.
You contemplate looking for him, but Sam’s even breathing keeps you locked in place. It’s not as though Dean couldn’t handle himself anyway, wherever he may be. There’s no sense in worrying over his absence.
Instead, you shed his jacket to free yourself, laying it to the side. Your hands kneed at your neck finally and fruitlessly. The odd angle prevents you from getting a deep enough grip to make a dent in the pain throbbing away beneath your skin.
“Sorry,” Sam grumbles beneath you, voice heavy and rough with sleep. He stares up at you with cutely squinted eyes.
“Not your fault. Did you sleep okay?”
He smiles, eyes still only half open. “Like a baby. Thank you.”
“No problem.” Your hand continues its work on your shoulder.
“Let me,” he says, lifting himself from the bed. Your brows barely have time to furrow before he’s pulling you closer, away from the headboard and positioning himself behind you. He adjusts you so easily, you don’t know how to react. You only stare forward, dumb as a rock.
His hand ghosts over yours on your shoulder. “Just here?” he asks into your ear. The sensation of his breath on your skin is oddly intimate, but you manage to refrain from squirming away.
“Really it’s the whole thing. I just can’t . . . reach.” You gesture with your hand for emphasis.
His hands adjust the neckline of your oversized shirt, one of Dean’s you stole when you were younger, to expose more of your skin. Then, they slip beneath the fabric as his fingers delve into your muscle.
“Ah,” you breathe, back straightening when he immediately finds the source.
Sam chuckles, working deeper at your skin with his hands. “There it is.”
There it is, you repeat in your mind. You let your eyes flutter closed and sigh, leaning into his touch.
“You’ve got a lot of knots,” he notes.
“Dean says it’s because I’m always on edge. My shoulders are pretty bad.”
You don’t know how Dean managed to notice that you have a bad habit of tensing your muscles. You certainly hadn’t until the random moment he’d offhandedly pointed it out to you. It was a subconscious mannerism you still weren’t able to let go, and it tore up your shoulders and neck worse than the rest of your body.
“I’ll get those, too,” Sam says, hands already sliding further outward.
You hum absentmindedly, eyes still shut while you focus on his steady hands on your skin. You’re too far gone to even register the door opening.
“Aren’t you two cozy?” Dean grunts. Your eyes pop open just as he drops some bags onto the table.
“She’s got a ton of knots,” Sam says a little incredulously.
“Yeah, her shoulders. I know,” Dean replies with his back to you as he digs through the bags, unveiling plastic containers. “You guys hungry? Figured we’d be having a late start today, so I went ahead and got breakfast.”
“I could eat,” Sam says, sliding around you to get off the bed.
The odd feeling that you’ve done something wrong chokes your words as you adjust your shirt back into place. Dean turns slightly to the side, still not looking your way even as he holds a small tub out to you.
“They had banana pudding,” he says simply. Your favorite. Usually the sentiment of being remembered would warm you up like bathing in the summer sun, but you still feel chilled to your core.
You drop off the bed and pad over to him, taking the container into your hands. “Thanks.”
He shrugs. The way he avoids your gaze sinks into your gut like an anchor drawing you down into some murky depth where you can’t reach him.
You’re left with the awful feeling that you’ve done something irreversibly wrong.
Next Chapter
Surrender to Dreams Taglist: @vampire-kissi3s
Supernatural Taglist: @mrrayjay, @timebomb1101, @saaucie
Dean Winchester Taglist: @itzpixiebabe, @whyyouegg, @megthedreamer21
Fic Taglist: @chxrrybomb22
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, Dean doesn't like the way things are going, 843/25943 words
A/N: First non-Reader POV chapter.
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 5 - Shared Beds - Dean
When Dean slips back into the motel room, he’s greeted by the sight of you in his brother’s bed.
Your back is propped up against the headboard. Sam’s head is tucked into your lap, your hand anchored in his hair and your own head slumped over in sleep. The positioning is not as disturbing as it might’ve been to see you intimately wrapped up in his brother’s arms, but that doesn’t mean the sight doesn’t bring bile creeping up his throat.
He reminds himself that you’re only trying to help his brother, but your kindness has nothing to do with Sam’s feelings. Or everything to do with it, if that ended up being a trigger for him. All of a sudden, Dean can only think of Sam’s boyhood crush on you, something that had only been a nuisance when he was younger. The childlike infatuation usually led to Sam forcing himself into your space—and Dean’s, since he was never too far from you—but that was never really an issue when Sam had only been a boy to you, a little brother figure. The four year age gap had felt so much further then.
Now that Sam was a man—it didn’t sit right with Dean to call him that, even though it was the truth—that old crush felt almost like a threat, an encroachment on something Dean had never had to doubt before. Dean had assumed it had gone away with time, but maybe it had only been tucked away when Sam abandoned all of you for his life at Stanford. Has proximity to you reminded Sam of all the reasons you were worth loving?
Dean shakes the thought away. He was being ridiculous, obviously. Sharing a bed didn’t mean anything. He’d shared a bed with you numerous times over the years, and you were still friends, just as you’d always been. As you always would be, if he kept up his efforts to keep you at a safe distance. The balancing act of too close and too far was a tiresome thing, and it aged him beyond his twenty-six years, but it was worth it to keep you from being burned.
Dean swallows as he shrugs off his jacket. He pads to you and Sam and drapes the heavy thing over your bare arms, tucking it behind Sam’s head. Your legs, which are still hanging off the bed from the unfulfilled intention of stealing away once Sam drifted off, he lifts to place on the mattress.
Your even breathing stutters, and Dean pauses with his hands frozen on the soft skin of your calves. He soothes his palms down the length of your legs, both urging you to fall back under and savoring the stolen moment of contact.
“Dean,” he imagines you calling in a sleepy haze, but your breathing calms again. He doesn’t hear the reassurances he so desperately wants to hear but doesn’t deserve. No awkward apologies fall from your sweet lips, and you don’t shift to slip away from Sam. He accepts that you won’t be coming to his bed, the one you’ve been sharing since Sam joined the two of you on this mission to find Dad. You won’t be sleeping next to Dean, just close enough to feel your warmth and just far enough for it to hurt. Not tonight.
Tonight, you’ll be with Sam.
Maybe, not just tonight, he thinks, even though he’s not ready to consider that future, the one that becomes more and more certain the longer he watches you two together. Sam clings tighter to you in his sleep, as if to prove Dean right.
At some point, ready won’t matter. How long, really, can he watch you and Sam slide together like puzzle pieces before he has no choice but to accept fate?
He’d never once imagined this. Dean had pictured you and him as an inseparable team until the end, although he’d never give you what he knew you dreamed of. You thought you were so slick, hiding yourself from him when he knew you better than anyone. He noticed those too sweet looks you gave him. He only pretended not to see.
What you didn’t know is that he dreamed of it, too, when he let his more selfish, depraved thoughts overtake his conscience. He allowed himself to pretend that he could be good enough for you on some faraway someday, even though he’d never be good enough for you.
Now when he pictured that someday, all he could seem to see was you and Sam together with him at the edge, hanging like a loose thread that needed trimming.
Dean sheds his layers and drops himself into the cold bed waiting for him on the other side of the room. He should be happy to have the extra space, but as he settles on the far end of the bed, closest to the door, and sinks his eyes on your figure, a dull soreness eats away at the inside of his chest until sleep finally stakes its claim on him.
Next Chapter
Surrender to Dreams Taglist: @vampire-kissi3s
Supernatural Taglist: @mrrayjay, @timebomb1101, @saaucie
Dean Winchester Taglist: @itzpixiebabe, @whyyouegg, @megthedreamer21
Fic Taglist: @chxrrybomb22
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, Sam can barely keep his eyes open, and Dean can't keep them in one place, 900/25943 words
A/N: Trying to pull GIFs from the closest episode. Have you noticed?
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 4 - Watchful Eyes - You
DECEMBER
“Oh, Sam. Maybe we should head back to the motel,” you urge after Sam’s head slips from his hand for the third time since finding a booth to sit at in the bar Dean had picked out for “a change of scenery.” A month or so of inconsistent sleep seemed to be finally catching up to him.
The search for John had been fruitless. After hearing his updated voicemail, you at least knew that he was still alive, which was a relief in its own way. Still, it didn't mean you were any closer to finding him, and the climbing number of days fueled by wild goose chases didn’t seem to be resting well on Sam’s shoulders.
He shakes his head with a frown, threading his fingers through his hair. “I’m fine,” he grunts. The newspaper in his free hand rustles as he flips the page. His eyes, dull with sleep deprivation, flex open in an attempt to keep them from drifting shut. Worry guides your own eyes to search for Dean, someone who would back you up without hesitation, especially when it came to Sam’s health.
The older Winchester brother is hustling drunks at the bar’s pool table, although his gaze is less occupied with the actual game than it is with a group of college-aged girls that just walked in. He grins when a pretty woman with shiny black coils catches his eye. He’s too distracted to notice your signal flare, so you turn back to Sam to handle him yourself.
“You’re practically falling over,” you scold, seeing the gradual droop in his posture.
“I’m fine,” he repeats, gruff at having your steady attention on him once more. He props himself back up to prove his point. You sigh and reach across the table to take his hand in yours.
“You’re pushing yourself too hard, Sam.”
He tears his eyes away from the paper to look at your hand over his. Embarrassed, your arm jerks to reel back into your own bubble, but your fingers are caught in his. His body crumples in a deep sigh.
“I know,” he says into the palm that drags over his face. His thumb draws idly along your skin, an odd sensation, not necessarily unpleasant, just unfamiliar. “It’s just, every time I close my eyes, I see her . . . on the ceiling.” His breathing falters, freezing after a sharp intake.
Your other hand reaches to cup over his. “I know.”
He smiles softly. “It’s easier . . . with you. That thing you do.” He gestures vaguely over his head, jostling his bangs.
“You used to like that when your were younger. Always helped you sleep.”
“Yeah, well,” he leans closer, playfully whispering, “Still works. Like a charm. But don’t tell Dean I said that.”
You laugh. “Don’t worry. Your secret’s safe with me,” you say, although Dean already knows everything there is to know about Sam. “Come on. Let’s head back. Get you some rest.” You slide out of the booth, and Sam follows.
“Dean?” he checks.
Your eyes skim the room to find Dean chatting up the coily-haired beauty and her friends at the bar. The sight hurts just as much as the first time.
“He seems busy,” you murmur. Sam scoffs.
You let him lead the way to the door, but just as he slips outside, someone catches your wrist.
“What’s going on?” Dean asks, a furrow in his brow.
“Sam can hardly keep his eyes open. We’re going to head back to the motel and see if he can’t get some sleep. Don’t worry. I’ve got him, so you can . . . finish up here,” you say, glancing over his shoulder at the girl who’s sizing you up from the bar. She doesn’t know yet that you’re no threat to her when it comes to Dean’s affections.
It’s better that you aren’t, you remind yourself. When has Dean ever stayed with someone he’s given his love to, in whatever way that meant? You could be content with just this, if it meant having him without the threat of losing him. You loved him in silence for years, carefully holding your contraband heart captive in your chest to prevent scaring him with it. It was painful here and there, sure, especially at times like these when you got to see how he was when he wanted someone. But having him, if only as your best friend, was also so full of light and warmth that it made the settling worth it. Dean was your own personal sun, even though he preferred to think of himself as a black hole.
He follows your gaze behind him, and his lips are pursed when he turns back. His free hand dips into his pocket, and a jangling sound rings out before something metal is tucked into your palm. You open your hand to see his keys.
“Don’t want you walking back this late,” he explains out of the corner of his mouth. With how protective he is of his car, the explanation is needed.
You close your hand back over the keys, and his grip falls away. An echo of him lingers on your skin.
“Oh, Dean. We both know I’m the scariest thing out there.”
He laughs. “Damn straight.”
“You get back safe. She looks fierce.”
“What?” He checks over his shoulder. “Right. Yeah.”
“Bye, Dean.”
He watches you as you slowly draw open the door.
“Bye.”
Next Chapter
Surrender to Dreams Taglist: @vampire-kissi3s
Supernatural Taglist: @mrrayjay, @timebomb1101
Dean Winchester Taglist: @itzpixiebabe, @whyyouegg
Fic Taglist: @chxrrybomb22
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, Sam isn't doing well without Jess, 811/25943 words
A/N: There are a lot of Sam moments in this fic, but it didn't really feel right to tag as Sam x Reader
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 3 - Whispered Conversations - You
NOVEMBER
“How much longer are we going to spend here?” you whisper across the table to Dean. The question is more of a soft suggestion than an actual inquiry.
It’s been almost a week of searching for the thing that killed Jessica Moore, and likely Mary Winchester. The three of you have found nothing, and the hopes doing so have gotten slimmer by the hours. Whatever did this is long gone, vanished without a trace the same way it had when the Winchester house went down in flames.
Dean and you knew this four days ago, but to give those tortured puppy dog eyes anything less than one more day, and one more day, and one more day, would’ve been a crime. It was hard to say no to Sam, always had been.
“Not much longer,” Dean replies in an equally unnecessarily soft tone. Sam is such a deep sleeper that a conversation even at a regular volume wouldn’t have a chance of stirring him. Still, with the relentless nightmares that have been haunting him every night, he deserves every moment of rest he can get.
“You think he’s ready . . . ?” The “to move on” falls dead on your tongue as it recalls the sweet image of Sam’s girlfriend to mind. The implication of it hadn’t been your intention, but how else could you phrase it?
Poor Jessica. You hadn’t had the chance to meet her yourself. Upon arriving in Palo Alto, Dean had asked for the opportunity to deliver the news of John’s disappearance alone, brother to brother, and you hadn’t stayed in town much longer after getting Sam to join in on hunting down the Woman in White off Centennial. You’d only met Jess through her obituary in the paper, although you’d barely spared a moment to glimpse her sweet, smiling face in the picture above her name before you tossed the whole thing for fear of Sam catching sight of it.
“He knows just as well as we do that this is going nowhere. He’s stubborn and he’s hurting, but he’s not stupid enough to keep digging around the same spots for clues that don’t exist.” Dean glances over at Sam’s sleeping figure with a grimace, like his brother’s grief was his own. “We need to find Dad. That’s the only way we’re going to find anything.”
“Those coordinates?” you ask, referring to the odd set that Dean had found in John’s journal.
He nods. “That’s our only lead right now.”
“And if John’s not there?”
Dean rests his forehead in his hand. “Then, I don’t know. We keep finding cases until we get another lead. Keep his mind off . . . everything.”
“I hate he has to go through this,” you murmur, staring at Sam’s back. He’s almost a mile away from the both of you.
“I’m going to kill the son of a bitch that did this if it’s the last thing I do.”
Sam starts to twitch on the motel bed, whimpers slipping through his mouth. You stand quickly from the table, so you’re right by his side when he jerks upright in the bed, shouting for Jess.
“Hey, hey,” you coo, soothing your hands along his shoulders as they rise up and down with his panicked panting. “It was a dream.”
He scowls. “Wasn’t a dream.” The words settle heavy like rocks in your stomach.
“I know. I know. Just go back to sleep, okay?”
His face falls in resignation, and he allows you to lay him back down, turning over on his side so he faces you instead of the wall. Your hand brushes repetitively over his hair, something you’d done whenever he’d had trouble sleeping back when John would dump the boys off with your family for days on end, before they were old enough to look after themselves, or John’s definition old enough. Sam is still that sweet little boy in many ways, even with the egregious growth spurt he’d had in high school.
“You’re right about that soft spot,” Dean says when Sam’s breathing finally shifts back to snores. You smile with a surge of pride, both at being right and at being able to do even the smallest thing for Sam, and glance over your shoulder. You expect Dean’s face to match yours only to find a somberness shadowing his features.
“They’ll stop eventually,” you say, assuming he’s been upset by seeing his brother suffer another nightmare.
“We can only hope.”
You move to stand from the bed to head back to the table with Dean, but Sam’s hand catches your wrist as you try to slip away. His eyes are still shut when you turn your attention back to him. He must still be asleep.
“Stay,” he murmurs, whether to you or the Jess that lives on in his dreams, you don’t know.
Still, you answer for the both of you.
“Always.”
Next Chapter
Surrender to Dreams Taglist: @vampire-kissi3s
Supernatural Taglist: @mrrayjay, @timebomb1101
Dean Winchester Taglist: @itzpixiebabe, @whyyouegg
Fic Taglist: @chxrrybomb22
Pairing: Dean Winchester x F!Reader
Summary: You've always loved Dean, but Sam might need you more.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, alternating POVs, childhood friends to lovers, mutual pining, (eventual) emotional infidelity, John goes missing, and Dean comes to you, 1235/25943 words
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter
Chapter 2 - Long Haul Drives - You
NOW - OCTOBER
Dean and you had always been close, although the definition of “close” morphed over the years spent knowing each other. The circumstantial crossing of paths as kids became something more intentional when you entered your twenties, with Dean seeking you out instead of being dropped in your lap. Before Sam’s departure, your friendship consisted mostly of casual calls at odd hours and drop-ins whenever Dean happened to be in town and could steal a moment away. Infrequent as these moments were, they’d been one of the only things worth looking forward to in your day-to-day life.
When the family of three became just Dean and John, the two of you spent much more time together than you had as simple childhood friends or even as newly-freed adults. Whenever John skipped town and left his son behind with little to occupy himself with, Dean would show up at your doorstep with some case he’d found that he wanted backup on. Never mind the fact that Dean was so good that he never really needed that backup. For Dean, it was always better to have someone than go it alone. For you, there wasn’t a universe out there where you would ever turn him down. With John becoming increasingly distant after Sam, these hunts were more familiar than breathing.
That’s why it doesn’t come as a surprise when you get a message that Dean’s on his way to you.
You don’t even bother responding because Dean’s developed the habit of announcing his presence when he’s only a couple of minutes away. There’s never been any reason for him to doubt that you’d join him.
The cellphone lies ignored on your night stand, and you make your way outside to sit on the steps while you wait for the Impala to pull up. The purr of its engine announces his arrival not even three minutes after his message. You perk up, posture straightening and a reactive smile building just from his proximity. The promise of him is warmer than sunlight.
The expression on his face as he climbs out is more sobering than an ice bath. His eyes are wide with a barely contained panic that is so utterly uncanny on his face. Dean’s usually as composed as a statue, and equally hard to read. He doesn’t wear his emotions so transparently like this.
His eyes flash up to yours and back down at his feet repeatedly as he makes his way over to you, clenching and unclenching his fists as he goes. You stand quickly to meet him in the middle, brow twisting in concern. Your hands find home on the crooks of his arms, urging him to meet your gaze instead of staring off over your shoulder.
“What happened?” you ask, letting your hands fall when the contact goes on for too long.
“Dad’s MIA.”
“For how long?”
It’s not unusual for John to go AWOL. At this point, it’s even expected. So, for Dean to get this worried, so worried that he has to clench his fists tight to keep them from shaking, it has to be something serious.
He finally looks into your eyes. “Since the New Orleans case.”
“Jesus. That was almost a month ago.”
“Three weeks.”
“And you haven’t heard anything from him?”
He swallows, pinching together his mouth as he digs through his jacket pocket. “That’s the thing. I got this voicemail this morning.”
He reveals a tape recorder and presses play. The voice that springs out is certainly John’s, which would be relieving if not for the words he says.
“Dean . . . something big is starting to happen . . . I need to try and figure out what's going on. It may . . . Be very careful, Dean. We're all in danger.”
Dean cuts off the static-filled recording.
“Well, that’s not ominous at all. EVP?”
He nods and starts the recorder again.
A woman’s voice this time. “I can never go home . . .”
“You think the case went south?” you ask, even though there could be no other explanation for his worry.
“I don’t know,” he sighs and tucks away the recorder with unnecessary force. He shakes his head fiercely, hiding his hands in his pockets. “I don’t know. Maybe I’m just freaking. I mean, first, Sam. Now, Dad.”
You grab his arm, pausing his trembling movements. “Sam isn’t missing.”
Dean scoffs. “He might as well be,” he says bitterly over his shoulder.
“Dean,” you say, bringing his attention back to you. “Sam is at Stanford. He’s one long haul away.”
“You make it sound so easy.”
“It is that easy.” Your hand reels back to tuck close enough to your body so that it might smother the flame echoing on your skin from touching him. “You should tell him. About John. He should know.”
His face flinches like you’d spat in it. “Like he’d care,” he says roughly, but there’s a slight amount of hurt in his eyes that gives his bravado away.
“Dean, he’s your brother, and your father is missing. He cares.”
The guarded look on his sharp features falls for a moment, a sad hope surfacing behind those green irises. He’s not so alone as he thinks. You wish he knew that or would believe it without having to scrape for a second opinion to confirm his prayers.
“You think so?”
“Yes. Without a doubt,” you say, intentionally looking deep into his eyes so he can see the certainty in yours. A burning feeling flares up from the prolonged eye contact like the air has been stolen from your lungs. You have to look away.
You pat his arm once before turning. “Let me pack a bag. I’ll come with you.”
“You will?” His footsteps follow you inside.
“Yeah. I’ll be your backup.”
“Backup?” he laughs, although it doesn’t stop him from climbing the stairs with you on the way to your bedroom. “Isn’t the goal for Sam to be my backup?”
“Not for that,” you say, although you’ll certainly join him for as long as he needs, as long as he’ll let you. “In case you can’t convince him to join.” You flash him a smile. “Sammy’s always had a soft spot for me.”
Dean pushes your shoulder with a scoff.
“Whatever. I’m sure that puppy love crush is dead and buried by now.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure, Dean. I’m very irresistible.”
He shakes his head, avoiding your teasing smile.
“Right. Sure,” he says, propping himself up in the doorway as you shuffle about the room. It feels natural to have him here, amongst your things, in your space. You only wish he would take that one step further to actually cross the threshold, rather than stand just at the edge.
“What? You don’t think I’m irresistible?” You don’t check over your shoulder to see his expression. The risk of an eye roll or a sour face is too high for your heart to take. You have to be pretty resistible for him to never make a move, especially when he will do so freely with any woman that catches his eye. There must be something different about you, something wrong.
Can it be called resisting if there was never any want in the first place?
“I think you need to hurry up and get to packing. We’ve got a long drive to California ahead of us.”
“Wouldn’t be so long if you let me drive some . . .”
“In your dreams.”
Next Chapter
Surrender to Dreams Taglist: @vampire-kissi3s
Supernatural Taglist: @mrrayjay
Dean Winchester Taglist: @itzpixiebabe, @whyyouegg
Fic Taglist: @chxrrybomb22
Pairing: Eddie Munson x F!Reader
Summary: A one-time attempt to scratch an itch turns into something you aren’t prepared for when you realize that Eddie “The Freak” Munson is more than he seems.
Genre: Fluff, Angst, Smut, Hurt/Comfort
Content: no Y/N, Dual POV, opposites attract, friends with benefits to lovers, ReformedBitch!Reader (lmao), you fix old breaks, happily ever after, 161/17415 words
A/N: a little epilogue to tie up loose strings
Fic Masterlist | First Chapter | Previous Chapter
Chapter 10 - Better Days on the Horizon - You
You take a deep breath before knocking on the door.
“Hey, little man,” you say, a little hesitant as you ignore the look of disdain on your little brother’s face. It’s quickly morphed with confusion at the man standing to your right.
“Uhm, this is Eddie, my boyfriend,” you continue, gesturing to Eddie, who waves a couple fingers that he doesn’t need to support the big box of books, boards, and trinkets in his hands.
“Hey, little dude,” he greets.
“Eddie runs a D&D club at the high school. We were wondering if you’d maybe want to join us for a campaign?”
Your brother stares at you, brow raised and lips tucked back in a sneer that’s between confusion and disgust. He shakes his head, eyes tilting closed.
“Whatever,” he says.
It’s not necessarily the golden ticket you wished for, but you couldn’t really expect much more. What it is, though, is better than you can ask for.
It’s hope.
Surrender to Dreams Taglist: @vampire-kissi3s
Stranger Things Taglist: @ggdawgg
Eddie Munson Taglist: @itzpixiebabe, @loonylups, @sisteramycatherine, @clairecrive
Fic Taglist: @brrrainst3w, @bonnieprincess
