That was great!

aw!! this was so sad!! but so true...
I see alotta that lately...like people nag you for your actions but don't really think to ask WHY you are doing what you do...I think that's a big thing here...

hey...isn't the title of this a Keith Urban song or somethin?? lol...I know it's in a song...lol...
but anyhoo...great job! :D

This story is brilliant, seriously so. I've said that Dean needs to take a walk in Sam's shoes, just once. Put himself in Sam's place, feel what Sam has felt.

He just doesn't get it. In your story, he finally does!

Thank you so much for this!!

I am presently editor of SUPERNATURAL over at a new web site, I hope you and other fans of SUPERNATURAL will go over there and check out my discussions/reviews/synopses of SPN, old and new eps, and see what I do over there with our favorite show. Please give me your support!

Love, Robin
Editor, SUPERNATURAL

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let me know what you think!

Such a great look into Sam through Dean's eyes. I loved this, "Sam took the darkness of their mother’s death, the regrets of their father’s, the guilt of Jessica’s, the utter loss of Dean’s, and sold himself piece by piece, slowly but surely until there was nothing left." Dean's right - it is a tragedy. Nicely done.

That was really insightful of the plight of both boys. I loved the parallels you drew between Mary, John and finally Dean all making deals to save their loved ones but when it came Sam's turn there was no one to deal with no one to save and only himself to lose.

~~He should have stopped Sam; his first mistake was to trust his brother at all. He should have recognized it sooner, called Sam on the signs of his downfall harder...~~

YES! This!


Cat

OMG, this was beautiful... After that premiere, this made me feel so much better. I am really glad that I didn't read this before the premiere because it might not have had as much impact... I loved this, thanks!

This is so so wonderful, I've got tears in my eyes as I'm writing this. Thank you so much for writing and sharing this. I wish they'd let something like this happen on the show, let Dean see and understand this deeply why Sam acted the way he did.

My favourite part is this: "Sam’s sins are great and many, but boil down to the same Winchester flaw: the inability to move on. To let go. Sam took the darkness of their mother’s death, the regrets of their father’s, the guilt of Jessica’s, the utter loss of Dean’s, and sold himself piece by piece, slowly but surely until there was nothing left. The man in front of Dean now is nothing but a shell, a hollow echo of the man Sam once was, and that’s not a betrayal, Dean realizes: it’s a tragedy." - so brilliantly put, all that Sam's been through, and the way he puts everything on himself, with Dean's death being the final straw that sets everything afterwards in motion.

Oh, and don't worry about posting a lot this week - I think we're many who are happy to see alerts from you in our inbox!

Huge hug,

Abni

Yes, yes and yes. Before Sam is judged those judging need to walk a mile in his shoes.

AWESOME STORY!! I love all the Dean angst! It's a wonderful assessment of the situation as well as of Dean's emotional journey, of their family's emotional journey to where they were now. It's enlightening and poignant. Maybe Sam wasn't all together wrong about a curse being on the Winchester legacy, but I'm a Dean Pollyanna. I think that Dean was right in trying to capture family even if it was unrealistic and selfish. Hope can be heartless, the expectation of it, perhaps misguided, but without it, it's a life of desolation, both characterized by the Winchesters in one way or another.

Fav. Parts:

Dean understands the grief that knows no bounds. The weight of failure, the burden of loss. Dean saw Sam murdered before his eyes and, for Dean, the entire world existed and broke on that point. It was all there was, the only thing that mattered, and it was about love and it was about duty and it was just about the fact that there was nothing else without Sam. It led him to a crossroads where he sold his soul without a second thought.

-- WONDERFUL description. This illustrates so well Dean's tunnel-visioned view of his life and future without Sam in it.


Now, when he died, he could do it right, he could do it first, and he could pretend like he was a hero for it, and not the scared little boy that he was.

Because he had been scared. Scared of dying, scared of Hell; but mostly scared of life without Sam, which was what had started him on this path to begin with.

Time in Hell was long and hard, more than he could have ever imagined, and he feels like the demons pulled apart his soul, piece by piece, until all the parts of him were broken and spent. Castiel put him back together, but it’s like the pieces don’t quite fit, and not even the months since he dug his way out of that grave in Pontiac can make that any different.

--Again, wonderful! I love this introspection.


But it’s so easy to be mad at Sam, the brother he died for, the brother who took his second chance and threw it all away, for nothing.

Sam, though. Sam was the last of the line. There were no deals left to make, there were no quick fixes left for him to find. Just the endless years of alone that every Winchester before him had fallen victim to and no cure in sight.

--I LOVED THIS!! In one way I can see it Dean's way, that he wanted Sam to take the second chance he had given him and done something worthwhile, never considering that Sam would suffer the same affliction as Dean after losing him. Only Sam didn't have the luxury to save Dean in the same fashion, let alone in any other way and by being denied that sacrifice, it was almost only natural that he would fall to Ruby's convincing. Seeing at the only way he could make something of the life left to him. A bleak future without Dean in it.

Sam’s sins are great and many, but boil down to the same Winchester flaw: the inability to move on. To let go. Sam took the darkness of their mother’s death, the regrets of their father’s, the guilt of Jessica’s, the utter loss of Dean’s, and sold himself piece by piece, slowly but surely until there was nothing left. The man in front of Dean now is nothing but a shell, a hollow echo of the man Sam once was, and that’s not a betrayal, Dean realizes: it’s a tragedy.

--WONDERFUL and SO true!


Great story!! Loved every word!

There but for the grace of God go any of us. Truly. Amen and amen.

Very nice. :)

"Sam’s sins are great and many, but boil down to the same Winchester flaw: the inability to move on. To let go. Sam took the darkness of their mother’s death, the regrets of their father’s, the guilt of Jessica’s, the utter loss of Dean’s, and sold himself piece by piece, slowly but surely until there was nothing left. The man in front of Dean now is nothing but a shell, a hollow echo of the man Sam once was, and that’s not a betrayal, Dean realizes: it’s a tragedy.

For the first time in a long time, Dean’s soul aches, but not for himself. Not even for the world. But for his brother, who lost so much and got no easy out."

I love this summary and I hope that Dean does actually come to this realization. I hope...

AMAZING.

Thanks for this.

That last line was so fitting. I would only hope that canon will give Dean enough introspection to see this and how Sam came to be where he is.

I liked the economy of the scene, all taking place within one room while Sam slept. It made it that much easier to go back in the mind to the reflections that Dean is thinking of.

This is actually something of a respite from "Between the Lines of Fear and Blame", which is a awesome story, but a difficult one to get through because it tears at me heart to see Sam so low. One of the things that I always admire about Sam is how he always tries to do the right thing, and even if he gets kicked in the teeth by life, he gets back up and endures.

Extremely well written. Impressive insight into Dean's mind, his feelings toward Sam and the dynamic of their relationship.