smalltrolven | Fic: Wish Not Change (Sam/Dean, R) part 3 of 3 (Reply)

****

“You okay?” Dean asked, one hand on Sam’s shoulder.

“I’m really pissed that she didn’t seem to give a flying fuck,” Sam hissed.

“I don’t know for sure if we can trust her,” Dean said in an urgent whisper.

“Same here, she’s one of the worst kinds of people to have something as powerful as Rowena’s spell. But if that or the wall was the source of the extra power she’s tapped into for granting the wishes, then maybe she’s not selling her soul to a demon like most witches do,” Sam said.

“So we’re just guessing that she’s a not-so-good witch instead of a bad witch? We’re gonna give her a hall pass,” Dean asked.

“Something like that. It’s just like the story you were telling me, where you didn’t off the guy selling the real Voudon pouches back in the day, right? We need to let her go with a warning, and then stick around a bit to see if we’re right,” Sam said.

“Hanging out in New Orleans for a few more days? Fine by me,” Dean said with a grin.

“And no burning down the convent,” Sam said, hip checking him for emphasis.

“How did you know I was going to suggest that?” Dean asked, hip checking him right back.

“You always want to burn stuff, you’re practically a pyro at this point,” Sam said.

“Think we’re going to end up in the river?” Dean asked as they turned to go back to Rowan.

“If it didn’t happen last night, probably not. Neither of us wished for anything regarding children. And now that we’ve got the spell part of things figured out here with Rowan, I think my theory that the drownings were caused by the ghost of one of the Casket Girls is probably right.”

“Do we need to take this ghost out somehow?” Dean asked.

“No, I think she was only getting activated by Rowena’s spell and the physical connection with the wall,” Sam said.

“What’s all this about a ghost?” Rowan asked, looking genuinely curious.

“The people who drowned, most of them were wishing for children, and my guess is that the Casket Girl’s wish had been similar,” Sam said.

“You see, ghosts get messed up when they hang around and get stuck, her jealousy has been baking in the New Orleans sun for too long,” Dean said.

“The ghost was the one who drowned those people?” Rowan asked looking back and forth between them.

“Yeah, we’ve encountered this before, ghost possession, they get inside you and make your body their own, sometimes they’ll kill whoever it is they’re possessing, depends on the ghost,” Dean said.

“I read in the museum about one of the Casket Girls drowning in the river, maybe a suicide or a murder, it wasn’t clear. I’m guessing it was probably her,” Sam said.

“So it wasn’t me killing the people then?” Rowan asked, looking hopeful.

“You were an accessory to it. They’d still be alive if it wasn’t for you, so don’t go letting yourself off,” Sam said.

“We sure as hell aren’t going to be letting you off. Rowan, we’ll know if you step off the straight and narrow,” Dean said, undoing the cuffs.

“That a threat?” Rowan asked, rubbing at her wrists.

“No, it’s a promise. People need their souls, it’s not something to mess around with,” Sam said.

“All my customers went away happy as far as I knew,” Rowan protested.

“Yeah, the ones who didn’t die,” Dean said.

“And the ones who lived, well there’s no way to get the pieces of those people’s souls back, so hopefully whatever they wished for was worth the loss. They’ll just have to learn to live with it, but there’s no way to quantify just how many people’s lives you may have affected for the worse,” Sam said.

“We’re leaving without doing anything more to you because knowing that is the worst punishment we can think of,” Dean said.

Rowan didn’t get up to see them out, looking small and deflated in her chair as they closed the apartment door behind them.

****

So, in the end, Sam and Dean didn’t have to kill Rowan, or burn the wall of the Ursuline convent museum down just in case, even though Dean had really really wanted to do both. But as they left her cramped apartment, Sam held Dean’s hand the whole way back to the guesthouse which kind of made up for it as far as Dean was concerned.

“Listen, Sammy, this—” Dean shook their joined hands, “This is all because I wished for it.”

“And?” Sam asked.

“And, it’s not right, either me making the wish in the first place or the spell making it happen. It’s making you do something you wouldn’t have done without it, and I shouldn’t have wished for something like that,” Dean said.

“Wait, hold on, you think I didn’t make the same kind of wish?” Sam asked.

“What?” Dean asked, stopped in his tracks, stunned by the very idea.

“You have—you have no freaking clue do you?” Sam asked, with a sad smile.

“Apparently not a single clue, nope. Think you can uh…try to explain it to me?” Dean asked.

“I went back, to her stall that first day, while you were standing in line buying us beignets and coffee. I wanted to see if she did the same thing every single time, if she would have me say the same words all the other people had said. I thought maybe we hadn’t been able to hear it all clearly from where we were watching her.”

“Sammy, did you hear me though? I mean, did you hear what I wished for when I did it first?” Dean asked, terrified that Sam had done this thing just to make it even between them, even though he didn’t really want it himself. That would make this whole thing a million times worse.

“No, I was inside the museum when I’m guessing you took your turn, I only heard the people wishing before you,” Sam said.

“So you didn’t know what I wished for then,” Dean said, so relieved he almost fell over when he felt his knees buckle. Luckily, Sam was right there at his side, holding him up.

“I…uh, I think I have an idea. Dean, you should know something, I’ve seen it…the picture, you know the one that you have in your wallet with the writing on the back?” Sam asked, cheeks flaming red and hectic with embarrassment.

“Shit,” Dean said, his stomach sinking at the thought of Sam knowing all this time. He stopped walking abruptly and leaned up against the nearest wall.

Sam stopped after taking several steps without him and came back, leaning against the wall next to Dean so closely that their shoulders were pressed together. Dean tried not to panic, tried to steady his breathing and match it with Sam’s. This was it, the final moment, before it all blew up, Sam knew about the picture.

“Yeah, and I…I’ll confess I made a copy of it,” Sam said, pulling his wallet out of his pocket. He rummaged through one of the smaller sections. He pulled out a small piece of paper folded over many times. It was a copy of the picture with the same words written on the back in Sam’s own writing. “I always thought the picture was how we should or could be, I wished for it so many times before we ever got to New Orleans.”

“So when we both wished, you think we wished for the same thing?” Dean asked.

“I’m guessing so, yeah,” Sam said, picking up Dean’s hand and twining his fingers through.

“Then this is the real deal, it’s not from the wishing or the spell or any of that?” Dean asked.

Instead of answering, Sam pulled Dean’s hand up to his lips and kissed the back of his hand.

Dean felt the answer pulse into his skin, filling his body with the light and heat that Sam always filled a room with. He sagged forwards into his brother’s arms, his head hitting Sam’s shoulders, his hand over Sam’s heart. He could feel it racing just as fast as his own. Sam’s hands were on him then, all over his back, skimming over the top of his ass, and he pressed Sam up against the door to their room, aligning their bodies just so. They both groaned and frantically searched for each other’s mouths, lips brushing and pressing together, going from soft all the way to hard and insistent in a bare instant.

Sam somehow managed to get their door open and they tumbled inside the small room. Dean’s hands were on Sam’s shirt, tugging it up and over his head, while Sam did the same for him. They wrapped around each other, bare chest to bare chest, marveling at how the other’s skin felt like their own, but also like something they’d always been missing. Sam’s hands, his giant hands ran up and down Dean’s back, over his shoulders, skimming over Dean’s nipples that had gone taut with the pleasure of all the friction. He gasped into Sam’s mouth at the feeling.

Dean was being pressed down onto one of the beds, his brother’s strength laying him out like a human sushi buffet. Sam’s lips were all over him now, suckling at his neck, nips of sharp teeth and then teasing both of his nipples in turn. He writhed and swore under his breath, but Sam held him down which was even hotter somehow. Sam’s mouth was going lower, licking down to just above the waist of his jeans. Sam looked up at him then, eyes blazing with the heat and lust between them, asking a question that didn’t need to be asked out loud.

“God, yeah, anything, Sammy, anything—” Dean managed to say, trailing off to a garbled growl as Sam mouthed over him through his jeans. He could feel his teeth where he was most sensitive, exquisite friction edged with pain, even through the thick material. Dean’s hands were in Sam’s hair then, his glorious hair, holding him there, right there, oh god, he didn’t, he couldn’t hold back from…

He came back to himself because of all the motion, Sam was jacking himself, hard and fast, his face gone taut with pleasure, his eyes still locked on Dean’s. Dean managed to knock Sam’s hand away, keeping the rhythm up while Sam thrust into his fist.

“C’mon, Sammy, come for me,” Dean said, meaning it with everything he had, he wanted to see it, to feel it, to be the one to make it happen.

Sam unloaded on him with an unfinished yell of Dean’s name, messing them both up when he collapsed down on top of Dean. Dean allowed it for a long few moments until it became too hard for him to breathe. He rolled Sam off so they were facing each other and held Sam close so he wouldn’t fall off the small bed.

“You were…that was too—“ Sam couldn’t finish, still panting hard like he’d been off on one of his morning runs.

“Yeah, really, tell me about it, I didn’t even manage to get my jeans opened up,” Dean said with a laugh, gesturing at the wet spot on the front of his jeans.

“Think that shower in the bathroom will fit both of us?” Sam asked.

“I think the clawfoot bathtub is a better bet,” Dean said.
new orleans.jpg

***

They stayed in New Orleans for a few more days just to keep an eye on Rowan and her clients. And while they were there, they tried it out, being this new thing. Both of them were pretending that they were just two ordinary lovers on a vacation. And it mostly worked, and they were happy, and they didn’t feel like throwing themselves in the river or anything dramatic like that. Their souls didn’t feel any loss from whatever pieces they’d traded away for their fulfilled wishes, their souls finally felt complete.

They walked along the shores of the Mississippi and looked at all the historic ships that were tied up, they checked out all the museums Sam could find within walking distance, and got drunk on Bourbon Street several times just because they could. Every morning they ate as many beignets and drank as much chicory coffee as they could stand and listened to the joyous music of the streets every night. No one else drowned, and Rowan was set up in a different location that was well away from her old spot at the convent wall.

After taking nearly a week off from their normal life, they got a call from the real world. It was Jack calling, telling them that something was finally up with Chuck and so they packed up and headed back home. Just like any regular couple coming home from vacation a few days early because their kid didn’t like their babysitter.

Everything had changed, and everything was still the same, but somehow put right.