The beep of a car horn woke me up and for a coupla seconds, I was disoriented. Motel, check. Daylight, check. In a bed, check. Sitting next to Sam, so Sam was sick, so Dad was - where?

But even fewer seconds after that, it all came back on me.

Motel in Palo Alto. Seven am so we'd gotten two and a half hours of sleep. Sitting next to Sam so that Sam could sleep. And Sam might not be able to sleep because his girlfriend had burned to death on their ceiling last night.

Dad was AWOL.

Great.

Sam was sleeping, still half sitting up against all the pillows. I was mostly sitting up next to him, leaning against the headboard. I eased out of the bed, twisting out the kink that sleeping sitting up had put in my back. Sam didn't move.

I could function on two hours of sleep. I've functioned on less. I had to try and make the world as right as possible for when Sammy woke up.

There wasn't much for breakfast if I didn't go out, and I wasn't going out except to the car to get the coffee and granola bars. That'd tide us over until I got Sam squared away with clothes and - and whatever else he needed.

I pulled Sam's phone out of his jacket pocket. Twenty-seven messages in two and a half hours. Wow. I looked back at him, still asleep, still protected in sleep from the reality of what his life was right now. I put the phone back in my jacket pocket.

Sam didn't move when I went out to the car and brought in our little coffee maker and anything else I thought we might need. I didn't want to leave the room again unless I really really had to.

After I got the coffee started, I took a fast shower then had myself my makeshift breakfast. I was cracking open my second granola bar when Sam came awake, sitting bolt upright and gasping like he was out of breath.

"I have to call - where's my phone? I have to call -." He looked around himself. "Where's my phone?"

"Sam - what're you talking about?" I put down my coffee and went to him. "Call who?" Please not Jessica. "Sammy? Who do you have to call?"

"School. My interview. I have to call to cancel my interview."

I really couldn't think what difference it made now, Sam seemed set on hunting whatever killed Jess; what difference did a missed interview make?

"It's only a little past seven-thirty in the morning, Sam. Is anybody even going to be there?"

"What?" Sam looked around. He looked confused. "What time is it?"

"It's not even eight a.m. Nobody's even going to be there probably. You've hardly had any sleep, Sammy. Go back to sleep."

"Where's my phone? I have to call...where's my phone?"

Instead of giving over Sam's phone and risking him wanting to listen to all of his messages, I handed my phone over.

"All right, call. Leave a message. Then go back to sleep, okay?"

He took my phone and stared at it and fumbled it like it was alive and squirming. He got it dialed though and rested his elbow on his knee with the phone at his ear.

"Hi - hello - this is - um - this is - this is -." His voice was shaking as bad as his hand. "Sam Win-Win-chester. I - uh -."

He shot out of the bed and hurried to the bathroom, dropping my phone on the table as he rushed past me. I picked it up and finished his message.

"Hi, I'm Sam Winchester's brother. He won't make his interview today. Um - his house burned down last night, and - um - his girlfriend died." I could hear him retching in the bathroom. "Anyway, so he won't be there."

I hung up and went into the bathroom. Sam was hunched over the sink, scooping handfuls of water from the faucet into his mouth and spitting them back out. And in between he was dragging in air like he couldn't breathe.

"Sammy?" I pulled off one of the towels for whenever Sam needed it and put my hand on his back . "Just breathe. Take it easy. Just breathe."

He shut off the faucet and rested over with his arm on the sink. He was breathing hard and had his eyes shut. One hand came up and I thought he was reaching for the towel but instead he grabbed onto my arm and pulled me close to his side.

"I'm here, Sammy. I'm here."

He nodded into his arm. And tugged me a little closer.

"All right, Sam. C'mon. Let's get you back to bed."

"No. Please - no. I just - I'm - please, no."

"All right, take your time. Just take your time."

A minute or less and he straightened up and dragged a sleeve over his eyes and didn't let go of my arm.

"Can I just - sit - for a minute? I'll be all right if I can - just - sit for a minute."

"Anything you want. C'mon."

I dropped the towel on the sink and moved, step by step, out of the bathroom, leading Sammy out by the grip he had on me.

"Here, here we go. Here's the table. We've got coffee and granola bars. C'mon Sammy, here, just sit here."

I pulled a chair out and tried to gently steer Sam toward it. As soon as he sat down, he stood back up again.

"My wallet?" He asked. He sounded - he was - frantic. "Where's my wallet?"

"I'll get it for you. Sit down. I'll get it for you."

He sat down but turned in the chair to watch me go to my duffel and take his wallet out of it. I gave it to him before he stood up again. At least he wasn't asking for his phone.

"Here you go."

"Thanks." He said it quietly and I felt bad that he thought he had to thank me for something so small.

He opened his wallet and with the same desperation flipped through it until he found whatever he was looking for and pulled it out. Once it was out, his wallet fell to the floor and he didn't even seem to notice.

He'd pulled out a picture of Jessica. And he stared at it like he could will her out of it and back into his life. I set a coffee and granola bar in front of him.

"After - after awhile, we'll - figure out what we need to do today…" I said. Even though my brain was fixed on 'get Sam as far away from here as possible' I knew we couldn't do that yet.

Sam nodded, barely, and didn't lift his eyes from Jessica's picture until my phone rang. I had a moment of hope that it was Dad, but when I checked, it was a local number. Maybe the cops.

"I'm gonna take this outside, okay?"

"Yeah. Okay." He nodded and went back to looking at Jessica's picture. I went out to the sidewalk and closed the door and stood where I could see Sam through the front window.

"Hello?"

"Is this Dean?" A woman's voice asked me. It wasn't a familiar voice and my brain started clicking on who I could call to get another hunter to help her with whatever. Caleb, probably.

"Who's this?" I asked back.

"This is Katherine Moore. Jessica's mother."

Oh crap. Ohhhh crap.

"Is Sam with you? Sam's with you, isn't he?" She asked before I could say anything. "I've been calling his phone but he doesn't answer. One of the police officers gave me your number."

"Mrs. Moore - I'm sorry about Jessica. She - I only met her for a few minutes, but I could tell she was - special."

"Thank you. She was, she was very special. I don't know how we're going to -" Whatever she was going to say, she stopped herself. I could hear her take a deep breath.

"Sam's with you, though? Is he all right?"

I looked through the window at Sam. He had one arm wrapped around himself, rocking a little in the chair, still staring at the photograph. I could feel his agony fifteen feet away.

What was I supposed to say…

"He wasn't hurt in the fire, was he?"

"No, he wasn't hurt. He choked in some smoke but - no. He wasn't hurt."

…I got my brother with me, safe and sound, and there's not even one tiny bit left of your daughter.

"Thank God for that. Is it possible I could talk to him?"

Right, he couldn't even finish a voicemail message cancelling an appointment. Talking to Jessica's mother would destroy him.

"No, I'm sorry Mrs. Moore. He's not - he's not up to much right now. I can tell him you called…" when he was sound asleep and can't hear me.

"I'm so glad you're with Sam. I know how close you two are. I'm so glad he has you with him right now."

"He told you that?" I asked, surprised. "He told you we're close?"

"When we celebrated Jessica's birthday this year, Sam mentioned you, mentioned that it was 'Dean's birthday too'. When I asked who that was, he said you were his 'big brother'. A grown man doesn't refer to his brother that way unless that brother is very important to him, unless they're very close. I'm so glad you're here with him…"

Her voice cracked then and neither of us was going to survive this conversation much longer.

"I'll call later and see if he's up to talking with me, and I'll let you know when we've made the arrangements. All right?" Her voice tremored and I had to swallow before I could answer.

"Yes, that'll be -." Not fine, stupid. You don't tell a woman that funeral arrangements for her daughter are fine. " - we'll wait for your call…"

"Thank you Dean. Tell Sam that we're thinking of him."

"I will. Thank you Mrs. Moore."

That conversation finally ended, thank God. I went back into the motel room where Sam was still looking at the picture of Jessica.

"Is it worth it?" He asked.

"Is what worth what?" I asked back. His wallet was still on the floor; I picked up it up and set it on the table.

"All the one night stands. Are they worth it?"

"Worth what?"

Sam stared at the picture and pressed his thumb over it.

"Worth never being in love."

"Who says I'm never in love?" I asked, trying to get Sam to laugh, or even just smile, but he didn't.

"I loved her so much." He said. "And she loved me. I couldn't believe how much she loved me. With no strings, no conditions, no matter what. She didn't even love me in spite of how I am, but because of it…"

A couple of tears spilled over his eyes and down his face and he scrubbed them away roughly.

"I just - I can't think and all I want to do is think - and - ."

Sam apparently realized that he was rambling on and he stopped talking. He took a swallow of his coffee and wiped a hand across his mouth.

"I'm sorry."

What could I say? I wanted to give him the usual, tell him everything would be OK, that we'd get through it, that I'd take care of everything for him. But like so many other times in our lives, it was a lie. Only this time, Sam would know it was a lie.

So I told him the truth.

"Don't be sorry, Sammy. It hurts, I know it does. I wish I could make it hurt less." I took the next chair at the table and pulled it close to him. "Whatever you need, whatever it takes, you know we'll get it for you. I'll be right here."

He nodded. His eyes were red and raw and so full of trust that when he held Jessica's picture out to me, I thought for a minute he was going to ask, 'make her come back.' But he didn't say anything. He only held the picture and didn't say anything and I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do. So I put my hand around the picture too, letting my fingers touch Sammy's fingers, and we stayed that way a few minutes, both holding on, looking at the picture of a beautiful innocent girl who died because we got involved with her life.

"She was more than just a girlfriend." Sam told me.

"I know. I knew that the second I saw you two together. You stood next to her. You didn't stand in front of her, you didn't stand away from her. You stood with her. I knew right then how much she meant to you."

"I'm never - I'll never - there'll never be -."

He was telling himself, promising himself, vowing that he'd never love again, never let another woman into his life, never let himself feel that way about anyone again.

This one I could handle without lying.

"Jessica will always be the most special woman you ever met. The most beautiful woman you ever knew. She's always gonna be in that special place in your heart. You hold onto that Sammy, don't you let go of that."

He nodded. Then he nodded again.

I wished he was small enough that this could just all be a bad dream and I could pull him in my lap and feel his arms go around my neck and know as soon as his heart stopped racing that everything was OK again.

But this would never be okay again.

So I did the next best thing, I stood up and stood behind him, put my hands on his shoulders and held on tight.

"We'll get through this, Sammy. We're gonna get through this."

.