Thanks for this Clair. I really like the way you get into Dean's head and I hope we can get some of this in the show.

Beautiful and convincing stream of consciousness piece - touching, sad, sweet. Lovely.

Phoebe

Funny and sweet. I always love getting a peek into Dean's thoughts.

Oh yeah, I like this. Great insight, it could SO be true, all of it, I love how your mind works... If only we could have an episode that could portray all you wrote..;) Great work, love it, well done. :D

i loved it!!

I really like this interpretation of what Sam meant when he said "you have to let me grow up", and I think it's a very accurate one. Dean's realization that Sam wasn't asking him to not take care of him, but rather let him take care Dean too, is touching - their relationship has as many parent-child overtones as it does brother-brother and it's always hard for a parent to see (and admit) their child is an adult.

Nicely done! A really effective gradual realiation of what Sam was getting at - sharing the load. Dean doesn't do that and, even as a Dean worshipper, I can see that being wearing, especially as Sam recognises what it does to him.

Beautiful :)

L xx

Awesome reflections on Dean's part with regards to "Fallen Idols".

I bet it will take a whole while but as the older brother suspected, he will probably get a lot of practise letting Sammy take care of him - as equals.

You hit the point spot-on with "Sam was asking me for the undisputed right to take care of me. Same as I ever took care of him. Equal in being strong, equal in being weak".

Now that the first step is taken (and Dean even took the second at the end of the episode by telling his brother at the trunk), things will most likely work out fine eventually - and to both boys' benefit!

You have written an interesting breakdown of what Sam (and the writers) might have meant by the line, "You have to let me grow up"
Thanks for sharing your thoughts with us.
Until next time, take care.

Very nice. I loved it! You did such a great job. I loved about halfway down when:

"Okay, no, I know, Sam didn’t say I was a horrible brother, just that I’m bossy. Actually, all he really accused me of was being a big brother. I’ve been accused of worse.

By people I cared less about."

LOVE IT.

Bravo Clair, great story. I can understand where Sammy is coming from when he tells Dean you have to let me grow up. He wants to be equal he wants to share the load, not have Dean take care of everything. I hope the show doesn't lose that big brother little brother vibe it's the main reason I watch the show. I think Deans gonna always take care of Sammy because he's been doing it his entire life and he not gonna be able to turn it off just because Sam says so. But great story you never disappoints.

Yes! That's what Sam has been aching to do since season 1. Since Faith, and since the days Dean was faltering under the weight of grief and responsibility when they lost their dad, and since the crossroads deal... Sam wants to be equal, and that means taking care of Dean the way Dean has always taken care of him.

I'm so glad you shared that here!

Well, it took me four, no five big gasps of air and a lot of lip biting to fight back the tears this time. But you hit another one out of the park. That is exactly what this 'growing up' is, should be, about. Dean letting Sam take care of him for a change.

When Dean came back from hell the mask he wore was glued on tight and nothing Sam could do or say could pry it off his brother. Dean was so closed off to him that Sam probably felt it as a form of rebuke, a form of pushing him away just when he needed to reach out and be there. Take control as much for Dean as for himself. Because if he could take care of Dean when Dean was hurting this bad it would reaffirm that Dean was really here, back with him. Maybe not whole but mending, under his care-mending back to the way Sam thought he had been before.

It didn't happen very often at all before Dean's year came up. I re-watched a video of the scene in the barricaded motel, where Sam tells Dean he needs him to stay instead of going out alone to hunt VampireGordon. Sam's simple one word rational of 'because' was enough to totally disarm his brother. You could see the conflict and fear finally become revealed as Dean dropped his mask and he agreed to stay in-just this night to make Sammy happy. (Jensen's face was awesome in it's perfect play of several raw emotions at once) And I'd love to see Dean just once more let the mask drop so we could all see the face that only Sam (Sammy) knows so well.

Oh, I liked this!

Nicely done, Clair.