All Grace Abounds

By: Cheryl W.

Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural, Dean or Sam, nor am I making any profit from this story.

Author's Note: Well, here's the swan song. I've twicked it, rewrote it, scrapped parts of it and added things at the last minute so I'm a little apprehensive about it. Hope it doesn't disappoint.

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Chapter 7

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Sitting Indian style on the motel bed, Sam wound the sterile bandage through Dean's fingers, concentration drawing his brows together. When his brother tried once again to pull his hand free, Sam lowly shouted, "Dean, stop it!" his patience nearing an end even as he tightened his grip on Dean's wrist, cutting off the appendage's escape.

"Come on, Sam! You're making it look like I'm covering up some skin disease like Michael Jackson!" Dean whined heatedly, his knees almost touching Sam's as the brothers sat face to face on the bed. "You don't need to wrap it through my fingers!" Dean growled disapprovingly, attempting to extract his hand from Sam's hold with more force.

Yanking on the wrist in his hand to keep it in his possession, Sam sent a glare at his brother. Drawing on all the patience he had left, he began to recite, "Dean, the doctor said.."

"Dude, you sound like you're ten again! 'Dad said to do this, Dad said you shouldn't do that, Dad said, Dad said…'" Dean mimicked, screwing up his face in a scowl. "You were a freakin' broken record."

"Hey, it was the first time Dad told me to take care of you, so excuse me fortaking it seriously," Sam defended, his grip unintentionally slipping down his brother's fingers, making contact with the torn skin. His touch elicited a sharp intake of breath from Dean. "Oh..Sorry," Sam grimaced, instantly resettling his hold onto the uninjured area of his brother's fingers.

"Yeah, whoops. There's another lawsuit against you," Dean grumbled, leaning forward to inspect his hand which was still imprisoned in his brother's hold. "And Dad didn't tell you to take care of me, you took that assignment all on your own."

"No, I didn't, Dean," Sam emphatically refuted, his gaze only treated with the top of his brother's bowed head. "Dad gave me the lists of dos and don'ts that the doctor gave to you, then spelled out his own list of dos and don'ts, and he posted the numbers for the doctor, the hospital and his cell phone on the refrigerator. And before he left, he made me promise to take care of you."

Dean's head snapped up and surprise glinted in his green eyes. All of this was news to him. "I wasn't that sick," Dean quietly said, wondering if Sam was mistaken, was confusing his memories.

"Dean, you had pneumonia. Were in the hospital three days," Sam pointed out, shaking his head. 'Leave it up to Dean to forget such details.' Putting his focus back on his brother's current hurts, Sam wound the bandage around Dean's palm. But the memories weren't so readily banished. Sharply he recalled the weight that had settled on his ten year old shoulders, the terrifying worry that he would fail in his duty to protect Dean, to take care of him as well as Dean had always taken care of him. Remembered waking up in the middle of the night, sprinting from his bedroom, practically running to his brother's room, needing to hear the still marginally strenuous breathes of his brother, to touch Dean's forehead to ensure that his fever hadn't climbed, to reassure himself that Dean hadn't slipped away from him, hadn't gone somewhere he couldn't follow.

Feeling tension begin to radiate from Sam, Dean's eyes narrowed as he catalogued the events of that time. He remembered waking up in each morning to find Sam asleep beside him, remembered breakfast in bed and little nursemaid Sammy playing 'it's time for your medicine'. But he also vividly recalled the arguments that had sprung up between him and Sam during those solitary days in the apartment….when he disobeyed the doctor's orders and crawled out of bed, when he tried to leave the apartment because he was going stir crazy. But the most heated of their clashes was spurred on when he grabbed his sneakers, determined to go for a run. Before his eyes, Sam had morphed into a little version of John Winchester, giving orders and ultimatums and objections that all began with 'Dad said, Dad said, Dad said' and ended with 'I'm calling Dad if you do that, Dean. I mean it.'" It all equated out to be four days that all concluded with each boy slamming their respective bedroom doors. And yet, every morning, there Sam was, laying in bed with him, bringing him breakfast, shoving pills down his throat, taking care of him.

Caught up in his memories, Dean didn't protest when Sam released his left hand only to snag onto his right hand, poised to treat it to its own Michael Jackson makeover. The pieces were coming together now for Dean, making him view that time in a new light, as the first signs of what Sam would become years later, what he was to Dean now; his protector, his right hand man, his fiercest supporter and his best friend. "You did a good job, Sam," Dean quietly praised, causing Sam's head to come up, allowing Dean to read the wonder in his brother's dark eyes before a blush blossomed on Sam's cheeks.

"Wasn't much. Same thing you always did for me," Sam downplayed, wishing he had done more, that he would have been able to lift the mantle of responsibility from his brother's too young shoulders more often.

"Hey, I never hid all your shoes so you couldn't go outside," Dean returned, smiling, remembering how he wanted to throttle little Sammy for that stunt.

Sam smirked, "That's because I listened to you. And I was never some big old macho jerk who got the brainy idea to go for a run a day after getting out of the hospital!"

"It was two days, Sammy, two," Dean corrected, raising two wrapped fingers and waving them in Sam's face.

"Yeah, right. Sorry. Two whole days out of the hospital. That makes all the difference in the world," Sam sarcastically agreed, a reprimand lurking in his tone.

"I got an idea, why don't you wrap that bandage around your mouth, nice and tight," Dean suggested, a teasing light in his eyes belying his intentions. Snagging the end of the bandage roll that Sam was working from off the bed, he sent it arching through the air, unraveling as it went until it bounced off of Sam's forehead.

A mischievous light ignited in Sam's eyes an instant before both brothers lunged across the bed for the end of roll but Sam's unfettered fingers claimed the prize. "Open wide, Dean!" he taunted, reaching forward, aiming the roll for his brother's mouth.

Leaning back from Sam's long reach, wrapping his hands around Sam's forearms, Dean tried to stave off his brother's attack. But Sam pressed his advantage. Toppling backwards, Dean refused to relinquish his hold on Sam, pulling the younger man down with him. The bed jolt under Dean as Sam crashed down beside him on the bed. When the taller man's elbow landed in Dean's side, the older Winchester grunted as the air was knocked from him.

Having watched helplessly as Dean's head barely missed connecting brutally with the headboard when he fell backwards, Sam was determined to call a truce before there was bloodshed. "Time out, time out!" Sam announced as he turned on his side to face Dean and attempted to free his forearms from Dean's steely grip.

Unwilling to fall for the old "time out" con job, Dean tightened his hold on Sam. "No way, Sammy. You say "Brother" and I'll let you go."

Sam was opening his mouth to concede the battle, only for the greater good of his brother, when a knock sounded on the room door. Instantly and simultaneously the Winchesters stilled, their eyes connecting, their mirth vanishing in the apprehensive wake of an unforeseen guest. Releasing Sam, Dean sat up and reached for the knife under his pillow even as Sam rolled from the bed, crossed the two steps to reach his bag and pulled his gun from its hiding place.

Standing up, Dean had every intention of answering the door when he realized that Sam was already at the room's threshold, was waving him back. Irritated at his brother's protective tactics, Dean whispered in a hiss of sound, "Don't wave me off!" In response, he received Sam's raised eyebrows and a heated look which was accompanied by a forceful hand gesture of 'stop'. Dean bristled more when Sam had the audacity to mouth the word "stay" to him like he was some pooch.

Unwilling to cower under Dean's objections, Sam, stepping to the side of the door, called through the wood, "Yeah," his right hand wrapped tightly and confidently around his gun.

"Ah..I don't mean to bother you.." filtered through the door.

Recognizing the maintenance man's voice, Sam hastily tucked the gun in the back of his pants and gave a nod to Dean, watched his brother slip the knife under his pillow again before he opened the door, a smile on his face. "Hey, come on it," Sam greeted, stepping back to allow the man access to the room and to his brother.

Shutting the door, Sam turned to his guest. "I wanted to thank you again but I didn't see your truck when we got back."

"Yeah, I had to run a few errands," the man returned, his eyes drifting to Dean.

Realizing his social blunder, Sam quickly introduced, "Oh, sorry, this is my brother, Dean." It then occurred to him that he didn't know the other man's name, had been so preoccupied with worry about Dean that it had never really matter. "I never did get your name…" he prompted, feeling so foolish. It was ironic how easily immaculate manners surged from him when he was immersed in a con job and how blatantly bad his manners were when he was projecting his Sam Winchester, college graduate, persona.

"I'm Ethan," the older man announced, reaching his hand out to Dean.

Lifting his right hand to meet Ethan's, Dean blushed in embarrassment as the bandage roll still tethered to his partially wrapped hand flew forward and unraveled along the length of the carpet. Sam's bark of laughter only made Dean's flush deepen. Dropping his hand before the handshake could be completed, Dean stammered, "Yeah, ah, sorry about that..Sammy's still working on his eagle scout badges," sending Sam a glare worthy of a grizzly bear.

"Well, you only look a little worse for the wear. Your brother was really worried about you," Ethan supplied, unaware that his words caused Sam's own cheeks to go pink, made the younger man gladly bend over and retrieve the bandage from the floor because it offered him a momentary reprieve from his brother's eye contact. Sam didn't have to look at his brother to know Dean would be wearing a cocky smile.

"I appreciate that you gave him a lift to the hospital. I was glad he was there," Dean sincerely admitted, his eyes straying from Ethan's to land on Sam's stunned but pleased expression.

"Glad I could do it," Ethan honestly confessed before he turned back to Sam. "Well, I just couldn't help myself from stopping in. Wanted to make sure you got back ok and see how your brother was. I'll be taking my leave now." Opening the door he was half way out when he asked, "You boys sticking around town for a few days? I can give you some tips where to eat."

"We're heading out tomorrow," Dean firmly answered, looking to Sam instead of Ethan, reclaiming his victory of the earlier debate with his brother.

Resigned, Sam conceded to Dean's wishes but didn't try to conceal the worry and protest that still sparked in his eyes as they lanced into Dean. "Yeah, we're going to pay a visit to someone in the hospital and then we'll be leaving town," swiveling his look to Ethan and putting on a fake smile as if everything was just swell. 'Yup, I'm thrilled to stay in your little town another day, to uphold Dean's promise to visit a twelve year old kid tomorrow, a kid in the hospital. So what if the kid's parents could put Dean next in line for a lethal injection, why worry about something so trivial as that?!'

Oblivious to the tension that hummed between the brothers, Ethan amicably suggested, "Well, you should try the Highwaymen's diner on Main Street for breakfast. They serve a mean platter of creamed chipped beef. Night." Then the older man slipped out of the door and quietly shut it behind him, leaving the brothers alone once again.

"Nice guy," Sam allowed, turning to Dean who was wearing a cocky grin. Tilting his head, Sam pressed, "What?"

But Dean just smiled wider and shook his head, dropping his eyes to inspect the loose bandage on his right hand. "Nothing, dude." But there was a mischievous nuance in his tone.

"What Dean?!" Sam pressed, hands on his hip, standing tall, waiting, sensing that his brother was getting his jollies at his expense.

"You," Dean snorted, his eyes shooting up to Sam's confused expression. "You accuse me of spilling my guts to strangers and you, you're busy upchoking your emotions at any stranger that passes by," his words not so much a judgment as a deduction.

"I do not!" Sam denied heatedly, his voice notching higher, would have squeaked in his adolescent years.

Without preamble, Dean stilled as something occurred to him, causing a worried, uncomfortable look to mar his handsome features, his wide eyes to fix on Sam and his voice to be low and his words halting. "Please tell me you didn't…I mean when I was…you know, in lala land after the accident…. you didn't do anything embarrassing did you? You know, like blubber at my side or roam the halls yelling my name or anything?"

To Sam's credit he didn't miss a beat. "No, no blubbering," he reassured evenly, a look of honesty on his face. But a moment later he winced dramatically. "Oooohhhh right, I forgot."

"Forgot what?" Dean demanded, his nerves taut, drawn in by his brother's tactics.

"Well…nah, you don't need to know about it," Sam waylaid, starting to walk past Dean.

Stepping into Sam's path, Dean said dangerously, "Oh yeah, I wanna know. Spill, Sammy!"

"Well, I .."Sam stammered, his eyes sliding between his brother's apprehensive face to the floor, biting his lip for good measure. "There was that one time I…"

"Yeah, you what?" Dean baited, feeling more tension settle in his shoulders.

Sam fought hard to keep the smile from his lips at his brother's worried expression. "Well I…I crawled into the bed with you…" At Dean's horrified look, Sam's laughter broke free, ruining his deception. He was laughing so hard he could barely choke out the rest of his joke, "Yeah I put your head on my shoulders."

"Ah shut up!" Dean ordered, chuckling, as he turned his back on Sam and walked toward the table. But to his surprise, the bandage on his right hand inexplicably tightened. Turning, Dean tracked the bandage from his hand across the distance that stretched out between himself and his still laughing brother.

"Dude, you should have seen your face just now! You were swallowing it all, hook, line and sinker," Sam grasped out between his laughter, bending over because his gut was starting to hurt, astounded that he could laugh at an event that had very nearly broken him. Leave it up to Dean to give him the opening to twist the worst things of their lives into some sick lame joke.

Stalking back to Sam, Dean ripped the bandage roll from his brother's grip, "I was not."

"Were too. Man that was so prime. That..that was my best work, you gotta admit that, " Sam boasted, a content smile on his face.

Having never built up an immunity to Sam's smile, Dean couldn't keep a smirk from pulling onto his lips or fight down the unexpected surge of pride he felt at Sam's charade. "You shouldn't have laughed so soon, Sammy," he critiqued jovially, like he was again teaching his sibling the finer points that made up a seamless con job.

"I know, I know but you…the look on your face …I…" Sam couldn't hold back his croak of laughter. Gasping for breath he said, "That was priceless, Dean, priceless."

"Just great.." Dean sighed, before his eyes sent a threat at Sam. "Laugh it up, geek boy, you know what payback's are…"

"Yeah, exactly what you are," Sam shot back, skipping back a step and causing Dean's swiping hand to simply cut through the air.

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Stepping into Kyle's hospital room, Dean was immeasurably relieved to find the boy sitting up in his bed, sporting color in his face and missing that aura of vulnerability that had hurt Dean in places he did not wish to acknowledge. The same places that could admit that he was glad Sammy was only a pace behind him, that his brother would be meeting Kyle, that he wasn't going to have to say goodbye to the little boy alone.

"You look strong enough to pull the ears off a Gundark," Dean quoted as he approached, instantly generating a surprised, glowing smile from the boy.

"You're a Star Wars fan?" Kyle asked incredulously, awed anew at just how cool Dean Winchester was.

"Absolutely," Dean drawled, coming to a halt at Kyle's side. Pointing to Sam, he introduced, "Kyle this is my brother, Sam."

"Hey," Sam greeted with a smile. He was rewarded with a return "Hey" along with a moment of brief, wary eye contact before the boy's enthralled attention returned to his brother.

"Which is your favorite, Prequel or Originals?" Kyle hazarded, watching Dean's every reaction.

"Originals. How about Star Trek? Next Generation or…" Dean parried back.

"Original. No one tops Captain Kirk," the boy cut in adamantly.
"Give me five on that one," Dean proudly said, holding out his hand, letting Kyle's smaller hand slap into his palm. "Sam here liked the bald guy.." Dean lowly tattled, shaking his head in disbelief and shame, pleased that Sam, playing along, donned a look of shocked irritation, which the warmth in his eyes negated. "It's hard to believe sometimes that we're brothers," Dean drawled in mocking remorse, his sparkling eyes swinging from Sam's to Kyle's.

Giving Dean a slight nudge with his shoulder, Sam countered, "Sorry, Dean. You're stuck with me."

At the brothers' interaction, Kyle smile encompassed Sam as he started to look at the taller man in a new light, as less the villain and more the trustworthy sidekick to his hero.

"See what I have to put up with," Dean sighed before his eyes turned serious. "But you really do look good, Kyle."

"I feel pretty good too. I wanted to give you something.." Kyle began, turning to the nightstand and retrieving a small box.

"Hey, I don't need any thank you gifts, Kyle," Dean gently protested, as the boy held out the box to him.

"It's not really a thank you gift it's more …" Shooting an uncomfortable look from Dean to Sam and back to Dean, Kyle swallowed down his fear. "Well, I just wanted to give this to you…so you'd…you know, remember me."

Blindsided by the boy's desire to connect with him, to be remembered by him, Dean had to clear his suddenly thick throat before he could vow, "I won't forget you, Kyle."

"I really want you to have this. My grandfather gave it to me," Kyle persisted, still offering the box to Dean.

"No, really, Kyle. If it was from your grandfather…" Dean contested, raising his hands but the boy's unflappable words overrode his own.

"My Dad said I could give it to you and I want to, Dean." His eyes fleetingly skipping to Sam, Kyle again focused on Dean, knew that he couldn't say all he wanted to in the presence of Dean's brother but wanted to say something, to convey that he kept his promises too. "Dad and I talked last night…about a lot of things and it went OK, better than I ever thought it would."

Dean understood what the boy was saying, what he didn't want to spell out with Sam in the room. The pact they had made, Kyle was upholding it, was letting his father really get to know him. "That's good and I'm…" Dean wanted to let Kyle know he hadn't forgotten his own pledge but it was hard with Sam there, watching him, hanging on his every word. Settling on vagueness, Dean offered, "I'm trying to do my part too," feeling a burning need to look at Sam but didn't, couldn't.

Easily reading the pride for him in Dean's eyes, Kyle felt his desire to give the older man the gift burn even brighter in him. Looking down at the box in his hand, Kyle shyly revealed, "It's nothing much really. But it always meant something to me." Raising his eyes to meet Dean's, the boy said with more conviction, "I think it'll mean something to you. Please take it," he entreated, holding the box out to Dean again.

With measured care, Dean reached out and took the small box from the boy. He opened the lid slowly, revealing an engraved brass bookmarker. Reaching inside, Dean picked up the bookmarker and tilted it in his palm so the etched words were discernible against the polished metal.

'Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.' –Matthew 11:28

As Sam watched his brother open Kyle's gift, pride surged through him at the reverent way Dean withdrew the bookmarker from the box, as if the gift rivaled any his brother had ever received. So there was absolutely no forewarning for Dean's reaction. In shocked stupor, Sam witnessed all the blood drain from Dean's face, saw his brother's battle honed body stiffen as if against an unforeseen annihilating assault. "Dean?!" Sam called out in concern, in fear, stepping closer to Dean, his hand coiling around Dean's arm even as his shoulder touched his brother's. "Are you OK?" his eyes fastened onto his brother's pale profile, gutted by the grief-stricken look stealing across Dean's strong features.

"I'm sorry…it was a dumb thing to give you. You don't have to take it.." Kyle stammered, fighting tears of frustration and embarrassment.

At the boy's words, Dean shook his head and hoarsely said, "No." Raising his head, he met Kyle's fearful expression. "No, I ….I want to keep it."

"But it……." Kyle didn't know how to label the other man's response to his gift.

Sam had no such problem. "It hurts you," he breathed out, his voice cracking, his hold tightening on Dean's arm.

Dean's look settled back onto the bookmarker. Running his thumb reverently over the etched words, he nodded before meeting his brother's eyes. "Yeah, but in a good way, Sam." Turning to Kyle, Dean rallied himself to open up to the boy, to open up to Sam, to let someone know him, even some part of him that he had tucked away even from himself. Between the boy's fearful expression and Sam's anxious presence at his side, Dean found the strength to step free of his barriers.

"Kyle, my mom…she had a handkerchief with this verse on it. She …she was going to give it to me when I…" Dean broke off, looked down again at the engraved words on the bookmaker as he scrambled to not let his voice shatter, to not let his soul splinter apart. It had been so long ago, another lifetime ago, felt as if it were someone else, someone else's memories that he was recalling, someone else's mother who had sat on another boy's bed, an embroidered handkerchief in her hand.

Tears sprang to Sam's eyes, not for the mother that he had never really known but for his brother, for Dean's pain that always hurt Sam as if it were his own. Forgetting that Kyle even existed, Sam gave Dean's arm a reassuring squeeze, felt as if a spear pierced his heart when Dean's pain hued eyes met his.

"She never got the chance," Dean forced out the words, surprised that they came out merely a breath of air, barely any strength to them, any volume. By Sam's flinch, he knew they had reached his brother's ears, had sailed straight into Sam's ever vulnerable heart. Ashamed that he had hurt Sam, Dean turned to Kyle, smiled an emotional smile, "You've given me something I've been looking for Kyle. Thank you," and then Dean stepped forward and gently pulled the boy into a hug, felt the small arms tighten around him before he pulled back. "I won't forget you, kiddo. Now we've got to hit the road but I want your word that you'll take care of yourself."

"I will, Dean," Kyle promised. "And you take care of yourself too."

Nodding, Dean turned around and strode for the door, felt Sam at this back, emanating strength and concern and protection.

Exiting the room, Sam quickly gained Dean's side, shot his brother a worried look but let Dean take refuge in silence. No words were exchanged as they stepped into the elevator or walked out of the hospital doors. But as Sam made to step off the sidewalk to cross over to the parking lot where the Impala sat waiting, Dean's hand latched onto his arm and yanked him to the right, causing him to stumble a few steps before his gait again matched his brother's.

Finding himself walking along the sidewalk, his brother at his side, Sam could only study Dean's profile, was left trying to interpret his brother's slumped shoulders, the hands stuffed in his jeans' pocket, the far away look in the eyes that looked over the hospital's snow covered grounds but did not venture in his direction. He knew it was not his place to ask, to push, to demand something that was Dean's and Dean's alone; his memories, the facets of his relationship with their mother, his mother, it was hallowed ground, guarded, protected, revered, and hidden, and buried and unmercifully painful.

"Mom kept the handkerchief in her Bible," Dean started, his voice rough and nearly taken away by the cool air, his eyes squinting against the bitter gale but not settling on Sam. "It was originally her mother's. She promised to give it to mom when…." Dean shook his head, bit his lip. He didn't like the territory he was treading into, it was foreign and painful and was leading him down a path he had sworn he would not go, could not go, not after what had happened to his mom.

"When what, Dean?" Sam gently asked, drawn into the tale as if his next breath counted on Dean's next words, feeling as if his brother's next breath was interwoven with the unfolding of the tale.

Taking in a bracing lung full of air, Dean slanted a quick look to Sam. "She said she'd give it to mom when mom needed faith the most." Snorted as if he thought his grandmother was a little buckets full of crazy herself. "Course that never happened either."

"Why?" Sam prompted, marveling at all he didn't know about his own family tree.

Meeting Sam's inquiring look, Dean revealed, "Mom's parents died in a car accident when she was twelve. That's why mom was raised by her aunt and uncle."

"I knew they died but I never knew how they died," Sam stated, without accusation.

Dean shrugged as if to say 'gone was gone' and looked again to the white horizon. "Mom…she said she didn't take their deaths very well, was sad, felt alone, was angry."

"She told you all of this? You were what three? Four?" Sam asked, surprised and almost disapproving that Mary had not sheltered Dean from such harsh truths.

"I asked her if she missed her parents, if she was sad they had gone. And she told me the truth," Dean quietly explained, turning back to face Sam. "She was packing away her parents things when she found the handkerchief and it…" He swallowed, cleared his throat. "She said she read the verse and she didn't feel alone anymore, understood that although bad things happened in life, God still loved her, that He would help her to be happy again, even though her parents were gone."

And Dean remembered the way his mother had smiled then, a smile that lit up the room, 'And you know what? God did it. I was happy again when I met your father, and then He blessed me with you and then with little Sammy. He kept His promise, Dean. He made things better when I didn't think they ever would be again.'

Returning back to the present, Dean pulled the box from his coat pocket and held the bookmarker in his hand. Then he held out the bookmarker to Sam, watched as Sam carefully drew it from his palm unto his own, knew the verse's fitting words would strike into Sam's heart as effectively as they had in his own. "She told me that when I needed to have faith the most, she'd give the handkerchief to me so that I would know I wasn't alone, that, no matter how sad I was, things would get better." Sam's words at Roy LeGrange's tent rang through Dean's head. 'Maybe it's time for a little faith Dean.' Now it seemed their mother's memory was echoing that sentiment, that maybe God was whispering it from heaven in the sneaky way that only He could.

Sam's chest tightened as the verse unfolded. The words were as if they were drawn together just for Dean, for him. And Dean's broken, vanquished words came to him again, came to him as they had time and time again when he was unwary, vulnerable, or scared. "I'm tired, Sam. I'm tired of this job, this life, this weight on my shoulders, man. I'm tired of it."

'Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.'

If anyone was weary, was burdened, Dean was. If anyone deserved rest, had earned a respite against the harshness of life, was worthy of shelter, Sam knew it was his brother, above anyone else he had ever known. "Dean…" he said brokenly, looking up at his brother, a tear slipping down his cheek, finding Dean's eyes were swimming too.

"Yeah, I know," Dean, with a raw voice, agreed with Sam's unspoken statement. It was piercing them both right through the heart. Reverently accepting the bookmarker back from Sam, Dean deposited it back in its box and stowed it snuggly into his jacket pocket. Then he quietly said, "Let's hit the road, Sammy," and they began to walk to the car, side by side.

"I'm driving," Sam claimed, snatching the keys from Dean's bandaged hands.

"What? Why?" Dean objected, raising his eyebrows as Sam headed for the driver's side door.

"Cause I'm not comfortable with old mummy hands driving, that's why!" Sam joked before sinking into the driver's seat.

Mumbling another token protest, Dean climbed into the passenger seat and watched the landscape go by as Sam drove them out of town. "What is this town anyway? Are we in the Bible belt or what? Miracle central? I half expect to pass Michael Landon hitchhiking on our way out of town, doing his whole "highway to heaven" gig," Dean sallied, using humor to conceal the knot in his gut that the events of the past two days had tied, nice and tightly.

"If I see Charles Ingalls, I'm not stopping but if I see Roma Downey…" Sam quipped, tossing a smirk to Dean, "you're kicked to the back seat, dude."

"So that's the way it is, huh? Kick me to the curb for a hot angel chick?" Dean sulked, leaning back heavily into the Impala's passenger seat.

"Oh yeah, definitely," Sam confirmed, his smirk turning into a full blown smile at Dean's snort.

The town was in their rearview mirror for an hour when Sam spoke, his voice hesitant, uncertain, making him sound much younger than his twenty four years. "So mom…did she teach you how to pray? How to start I mean?" Sam didn't pool his eyes from the road, couldn't look to Dean, didn't want to see censure or sadness or something even more painful flicker in his brother's eyes.

It took Dean a minute to get his throat to work, for the words to come. "She ..ah…she said I could say …" Dean sat up straighter in the seat, chanced a glance at Sam, saw the white knuckled grip his brother had on the steering wheel, the way Sam's eyes were transfixed straight ahead. When he continued his words barely carried the distance to Sam, "She said I could start with 'Hey God it's Dean'." Dean gave a small laugh. "She said God would already know it was me but she felt it was rude…you know, if you didn't introduce yourself, just like she taught me to do on the phone."

"Like you taught me to," Sam correlated, his tone soft, gentle and his eyes drawn to Dean, felt reassured, strengthened as he met Dean's tender green gaze.

"Yeah," Dean agreed, surprised and touched that Sam remembered that he had taught him that and not their father.

A moment laterSam tentatively called, " Dean," shooting a look to Dean, rewarded with his brother's full attention.

"Hmmm?"

"You know you asked…..wanted to know about …how it was…with you in the hospital…" Sam struggled to get the words out, to bravely revisit those terrifying hours when Dean was slipping away from him, was going where he couldn't follow. But Sam knew that whatever his admission would cost his pride, would exact on his heart, it would be a small price to pay.

"Sam, don't," Dean warned, recognizing the intensity in his brother's eyes, knew that this time Sam would tell the truth, would rip open his soul, would make himself vulnerable, for him, because he cared for him.

But Sam refused to be swayed. For once the truth would not hurt but heal, would not condemn, but save, would irrefutably proclaim that he loved Dean, needed him, not just as his protector but as his brother, as the other half of his soul. "I might have held your hand for awhile…" Sam shot Dean a look full of pain and embarrassment and love, "I might have blubbered…for a little while."

"Please tell me there was some hot nurse you wanted to impress with your sensitive side?! You know, show that you cared about your brother so you didn't come off as a jerk," Dean retorted, but his tone was too low, too unsteady to effectively conceal the fact that Sam's words had made his eyes tear up, had sent a pang through his heart.

Playing Dean's game, Sam snorted, "Dean, all your nurses could have been named Hildegard. They looked like those butchy masseuses from all those bad B movies you love."

"Great, thanks for that visual," Dean grumbled back, but there was love and gratitude in his eyes as they met Sam's. Suddenly they both smiled, real honest to goodness smiles. "You're such a girl, Sammy."

"Hey, you're the one that coddled me, not Dad," Sam accused teeth showing amid his wide smile.

"I didn't coddle you! I protected you!" Dean countered, the scowl doing nothing to diminish the happiness echoing off of his soul.

"Potato, Patato, Dean. You just have to deal with the end result," Sam drawled, dividing his attention from the road to his brother.

"I like the end result, Sammy," Dean honestly said, his look telling Sam just how proud he was of the man he had become.

"Yeah, well, you didn't turn out half bad yourself," Sam returned, his voice low, his own pride uncovered. Then a mischievous glint entered his eyes. "You're out there rescuing small children, hugging cops and district attorneys, making the world a better place, one snow storm at a time."

"Ah, shut up, Sam," Dean chuckled.

"No, I mean it, this can be your new PR package. I got the headline. " Raising his hand as if he was tracing the headline in the air, Sam announced, "Man wanted by FBI rescues boy, forsakes life of crime,"

Dean snapped, "How about this headline: Wanted Man surrenders to Authorities to escape from his Little Brother's sucky jokes."

"Nah, it's got no pizzazz to it, Dean," Sam sallied back, fully enjoying torturing his brother.

"You don't have any pizzazz," Dean parried.

Pointing a finger at Dean, Sam denied, "No you don't."

"No you don't," Dean insisted before throwing "Jerk," out across the interior of the car.

"Cop hugger," Sammy retaliated, laughter overtaking his words.

"Oooohhhh, that was a low one, Sammy," Dean drawled, shaking his head at the audacity of little brothers.

"I'm sorry," but Sam was smiling ear to ear.

"Yeah, you look it," Dean grumbled back, settled again in his seat but couldn't keep the content smile from lighting up his face as he looked out the side window.

A companionable silence fell between the brothers. So much was unsaid between them, yet so much was conveyed in their silence, in the very fact that they were together, in spite of the all they had been through. It was even more extraordinary to think they were irrevocably bound together only because of all they had lost, all they had suffered, all they had endured, side by side. That good had come out of bad, that pain had given way to strength, that the vilest act of hatred had fostered the strongest ties of love, of brotherhood….that four simple words could lead them down a path that they were always destined to travel.

'Hey God, its Dean…."

'Hey God, its Sam…"

SNSNSNSNNSNSNSNSNNSNSNSNSNSN

The End

Please let me leave you with this thought:

We do not always seek God but He always seeks us, always loves us.

Romans 5:20:But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

A trillion thank yous for every ounce of support offered to this story. I hope you know how much I appreciated every review, every person who read the story, every person who even glanced at the story.

On a side note, I was struggling on which verse to use and I was praying about it and then, wham, I went to church and the pastor said Matthew 11:28!! TWICE!! I have to admit I got all choked up. God is so in tune to our needs, it's incredible, it's overwhelming and it's humbling all at the same time.

Alright, I'm officially stepping off of my pulpit.

Have an awesome day!
Cheryl W.