Yep, some things even a hundred years in hell can't change. Specifically – get enough food in Sam's stomach, and he'll sleep through the night. He drank a quart of that chocolate meal-in-a-glass stuff and it steadied his nerves enough that we had an actual conversation, with eye contact and everything, then he laid down and fell asleep and slept straight through almost six hours.

I was all the way awake a couple of hours before Sam started his slow process of waking up and catching up. His breathing changed, from slow and shallow to fast and broken. His posture changed from stretched out to freaked out with tight shoulders and curled fists.

Sam was awake and scared and I couldn't go to him without scaring him even more. I hated that. If I so much as cleared my throat before he was fully awake and oriented it could send him into a panic attack that would take twice as long to recover from as just waking up.

So I had to wait, until Sam was ready for me to approach him.

It took less time each time for him to fully come around. More or less, less time each time. If he woke up naturally, that is. From a sound sleep, in a warm bed, it was usually only a few minutes for Sammy to become fully functioning again. If he woke up from a nightmare though, all bets were off.

This seemed to be a good waking, fortunately. His breathing evened out, his body stretched out, after a few minutes he turned over and sat up and looked over at me.

"Hey."

"Hey." I answered back, trying hard to not sound as happy as I was that he was OK as quick as he was.

"What time is it?"

"Going on ten, I guess."

He nodded up and covered a yawn and rolled himself out of bed to head to the bathroom. Things were looking good. We might even be able to get breakfast, sitting down in an actual restaurant and not just drive-thru. That would be good for Sam, he could get real food in a real restaurant which would be good for his blood sugar which would be good for his emotional stability.

Then from outside our room there was the sound of screeching tires and blasting horns and slamming fenders and in four long steps I was at the bathroom door. I didn't bother knocking, that would only add to the noise that would be ricocheting in Sam's head right now.

I turned the knob and opened the door slowly.

"Sam? It's me, okay? It's just me."

"Dean?"

He sounded scared and hopeful and not too far gone.

"Yeah, Sammy. It's me, I'm coming in. Okay?"

"Yeah? Dean? I think I dropped my toothbrush."

"Okay. That's okay. We can find it."

I pushed the bathroom door open all the way. Sam was sitting on the edge of the tub, hunched over, eyes squeezed shut. He was gripping the toothpaste in one hand and his toothbrush in the other and his breath was coming hard and fast.

"Sammy? How're you doing?"

He lifted his head and turned toward me. He blinked a few times like he was creating his answer. He shrugged a shoulder up toward the tiny window.

"I just - I just - it - it startled me."

"Yeah, I think somebody had a fender bender out there. You okay?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm okay. I just - I need my toothbrush."

Well, he had his toothbrush right there in his hand. But I wasn't going to be the one to bluntly point that out to him. Not with the way he was looking at me like I had all the answers.

"Okay, here. Let's get this taken care of. Can you stand up?"

He looked up at me like he didn't realize that he wasn't standing up.

"Yeah?" He answered like he wasn't sure that was the right answer. But then he shook his head like he was tossing a thought out of the way. "Yeah. Yeah, I can stand up." And he got to his feet and stood up nearly completely straight and moved to stand in front of the sink and mirror.

"Okay?" I asked.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm okay. This is okay."

He lifted both hands and looked at them like he was cataloguing what he held in them.

"I have my toothbrush." He said it like I didn't know he'd had it in his hand the whole time.

"Good." I answered, like I hadn't known he had it in his hand the whole time. "You got it from here? You want me to hang around?"

"Uh – no. No, I'm okay. I – yeah, no. I can do this."

Right. He was shaking like he was freezing and he could barely get the toothpaste on the toothbrush.

But he said he could do it, and I had to believe him, even if I didn't believe him.

"All right. I'm just right outside the door, okay?"

He had the toothbrush in his mouth by then, so he nodded and I walked back out into the main part of our motel room.

I just – God, I just wanted to grab Sammy and make everything right for him again. Put the damn wall back up – and I worked construction, I know how to put a damn wall up. Take away his shame. Evaporate his guilt. Derail his litany of 'what did I do, who did I hurt, when did it happen, where did I go after that, and how can I ever make up for it?'

But all I could do was pack up most of our stuff, duffel and backpack, get ready to get on the road again, and hope the next place we stopped had better drivers in the parking lot.

I kept an eye on the bathroom door. In a few minutes, Sam appeared in the doorway, shaving kit under his arm, looking around the room for hidden threats and obvious pitfalls.

When he finally saw me and relaxed a little bit, I knew I could talk to him without startling him. Without terrifying him.

"How're you doing, Sammy?"

"I'm good. I'm okay. I – I'm good."

He spied his backpack on his bed and headed that way. I'd packed up most of his stuff, but I couldn't pack it all because if he didn't have something concrete to focus on, he'd go off track again. So I'd left out a t-shirt and book and he had his shaving kit to put away. Having something straightforward and easy to do was good for him.

I'd left out a few things of my own to put away, so for a few minutes we finished packing up. I held back so that Sam finished first, so that after he zipped up his backpack, he watched me finish up, keeping close track of my movements.

"So, how would you like to do breakfast?" I asked him, while I was still packing. If his attention was focused on what I was doing, it wasn't unfocused on anything else.

"You want to go someplace." He said it and sounded disappointed and I knew it was disappointment in himself because he wasn't sure he could do that for me.

"Whatever you want." I told him and I meant it. "We've got the chocolate stuff. We can do drive-thru. We can do anything you want."

"What do you want to do?"

I want to make you all better. I want to keep everything and everyone from scaring you. I want to feel like I can still actually take care of you.

"Why don't we drive-thru somewhere."

There was more I could've said, that drive-thru would get us on the road sooner, or we could find a quiet spot to stop and eat, but short sentences were better. One expressed idea at a time was better. Sam needed to think about one thing at a time.

My super-smart, does the NY Time crossword in ink, memory like a steel trap, can-think-about-five-things-at-once little brother, right now needed to be able to process simple things one simple thing at a time.

And he processed that one simple thought while I packed up my final t-shirt and pair of socks.

"No." He finally said. And he said it with some conviction. OK, whatever. The chocolate shakey stuff was bearable. Whatever Sammy needed to keep making progress, I was up for it.

But that's not what he'd decided.

"No." He said it again and looked up from watching my hands to looking in my eyes. "We'll go someplace. I can do it. I'm – I'm – I can do it."

He stood up straighter and squared his shoulders and still had the look of somebody doing something he didn't want to have to do but by God he was going to do it. He slung his pack over his shoulder in one smooth movement and took a deep breath, and stood waiting like he was only waiting for me to get a move on.

"Okay."

He said he could do it, and I had to believe him, even if I didn't believe him.

I zipped my duffel and looked around for anything left behind and half turned to the door, keeping an eye on Sam to see how he was keeping up. He still looked half-puzzled and half-worried, looking at the door like he expected hell to be waiting behind it.

Then his eyebrows pulled together before he rolled his eyes like he'd just given himself a 'duh' rebuke. He marched across the room, and only hesitated a split second before he grabbed the doorknob and flung the door open and marched himself right outside to the car.

Look out world, Sammy Winchester, the bravest man I knew, was on his way back.

Some things even a hundred years in hell can't change forever.