Dead End Signs and Wasted Land

“I don’t get it,” Sam's restless voice interrupted the silence lingering in the dull motel room. He had been assembled in front of his laptop for hours, searching for anything possible that was involved with the word “Chowder” among the Hickory Metro Area, while Dean and I were kicked back on opposite beds, staring aimlessly at the ceiling. It was starting to annoy all of us; not being able to come up with any answers. I felt like we were a group of wind-up toys, constantly running into an old brick wall until someone would pick us up and move us in a different direction, but somehow we managed to keep returning back to that same brick wall again. It was pointless what we were doing- well… Dean and I were doing nothing to begin with. Sam was the one doing all the dirty work. “There’s nothing that connects to this. What could I possibly be missing here?”

“Maybe Ol’ Clam Chowder has nothing to do with it,” Dean stated clearly, pushing himself up in a sitting position to glimpse at his little brother, who was smothered by his own baffled expression. “I mean how many times have we come across something and it had no connection what so ever with what we were going after?”

Dean had a good point. We've come across a lot of things in previous cases where certain evidence appeared to be a major clue but ended up being something as petty as a grain of sand. Sam sat there in the wooden chair shaking his head pitifully. He had it in his head that this was still linked to the case, which I couldn’t blame him. I would be just as eager to connect the dots even if it seemed like a near impossible puzzle to complete.

“I can’t think of anything. I’ve checked into everything. No leads; no connections- just dead end signs.” he scoffed, ignoring Dean’s remark as he stared aimlessly at the air. I almost felt bad for him not finding anything on it. He spent hours researching something that after all meant nothing. Those hours wasted gave us less time to figure out what we're hunting, and more time for the attacker to kill.

"Maybe you just overlooked something," I suggested casually. "It's a common mistake that we all make."

Sam obviously was not liking the fact that I thought he was that laid back to miss an important detail. He was the better researcher out of the three of us. If we didn’t have Sam, we would be a couple of lost children in a mall, and that isn’t sarcasm. When it comes to research, we were next thing to worthless.

"I've been through endless pages of Oliver Duke's biography, the painting's history and moral. I’ve even looked into reports on the victims; no matches jive with this engraving."

I felt bad for him, I really did. He was trying so hard to find answers and it just made him look unintelligent when he couldn’t find a damn thing. I wanted to help him but even though I didn’t want to admit it aloud, when Sam’s brain is on overdrive and actually struggling on research, I wasn’t going to do much good but sit there and look pretty.

"Maybe you should check again," Dean insisted cockily. "Like Kayla said, we make modest mistakes no matter how many times we do something, even if I don’t like admitting it, it’s the truth."

Sam frowned at his older brother. The frustration was just steaming out his ears by this point, not just because of the failed attempt at research but because of Dean always telling him to keep looking when he could actually be doing it himself. However, telling Dean to do research was a joke in a half like I said. You could tell him, but he always wants to take the reins on killing evil the sons of bitches and leave Sammy to do research.

"No, I'm not going to check it again, Dean," Sam shot back in agitation. "I don't see you getting off your ass to help, now do I?"

Just by the tone of his voice, I knew this conversation wasn’t going to end with us all hugging and sharing our feelings. We may see feelings, but fury wasn’t one that we were all hoping for.

"Hey, I've helped out," Dean snapped haughtily. Sam turned his head, staring up at the ceiling while he let out a mere snicker.

"Oh you mean burning dead man, Oliver, who wasn't the problem after all? Bravo, Dean! Gold star for you!"

By this point, Dean was becoming a bit disturbed with his little brother. It was like a ticker went off in his head as soon as Sam made a smart comment, his tone immediately changed to blunt and relentless.

"Well at the time, I was the only one doing something I assumed was useful. Not pulling a Charlie Sheen on the job whenever I’m not around!" Umm… was it just me or was Dean pulling me down in this mess this mess too? And referencing Charlie Sheen- oh no…

Sam was speechless, eyes widening. I mean I was speechless, but very confused and nervous. Was Dean referring to when Sam and I- wait, how would he know that!? He left to go back to the cemetery and burn Oliver’s corpse; how could he have possibly known that Sam and I had remarkable sex when we were supposed to be doing research, or to Dean at the time thought we were just talking about him behind his back.

"Look Dean-" Sam started to explain, what I could only imagine, before Dean held a hand out in front of him to stop his brother from going on any further.

"Sammy, look- no need to give me the details.” Dean replied with an egotistical grin. “I'm proud of you and don’t want you apologizing over something I could care less about. At least I got to her before you."

My eyes shot open vigorously like I was struck in the back of the head with a solid baseball bat. Oh. My. God. No, he didn’t. Why would he come right out and say that to him? That’s our business that was meant to be kept between us. The least Dean could have done was talk it over with me first, warning me before throwing me under the bus like a piece of shit.

I jolted in an upright position, gawking over at Dean sitting casually on the opposite bed as me.

"Wh-what did y-you just s-say?" Sam stuttered quietly, closing the top to his laptop and stared intently at his older brother, giving him his full attention. Dean didn’t bother to wipe of the tasteless smug plastered on his face as he answered back, which lead me to believe that he wanted to do this and make me look like the fool.

"That I'm proud of you?" he replied in obliviousness.

"After that..." Sam stated, crossing his arms over his chest with confusion written on his face.

“Dean…” my voice croaked, hoping to stop him from going any further. Sam glanced back from me straight back to his brother, while Dean hadn’t even acknowledged my existence.

"Oh, you mean that I got my hands on her first? Yeah, sorry dude. Don’t mean to break your little fantasy." God-damnit. What had gotten into him? Was he even thinking about anything that he was smothering us with? Of course not if he was too busy rubbing it in to his brother that he had sex with me before him. I should have known sooner or later hell was going to break loose and have me fall flat on my ass. However, this wasn’t the way I had expected it to come undone.

I shamefully covered my face, hoping to just wake up from the horrible nightmare. Yeah, so maybe I did deserve this karma with a capital “DUH, YOU DUMBASS,” but I would much rather get the tension out of my system than to keep living with secrets. It made sense at the time, but I had no idea what I was getting myself into when I first got in the middle of these two brothers.

All the color drained off Sam’s skin like rain dripping down on a freshly painted canvas. Those words tore him to shreds. He was motionless, feeble, and bowled over for a mere thirty seconds before he brought himself together to speak aloud. God only knows what was really going on underneath the moppy brown hair of his.

"When did all this happen?" he questioned leisurely, but with perplexity.

“Well, if you really want to know…” Dean started to explain, only to be cut off by my frustration. He had already gone over the edge and I wasn’t going to let him leap further into this argument without giving me a say in any of it. I knew my two-sense wouldn’t help much, but I was done listening to Dean giving details when it should have been fleeing from my own mouth.

"Sam, I can explain-"

“Oh can you now?” Sam snapped back as he raised his voice, getting up from the wooden chair across the room and staring at me in annoyance. “Please, if you can explain to me why you didn’t bother to mention that you slept with my brother before I poured my heart out right in front of you, be my guest! I’m all ears right now and dying to hear what excuses you can come up with!”

The lump in my throat grew bigger and more intense to swallow; tears immediately filled up my eyes like enormous puddles in a haunted alley; I never felt so humiliated in my life. Sam was waiting for me to enlighten him with terminology, but truthfully I had nothing. I was just too broken to use my brain, not that if I did use it and came up with a good enough excuse that it would change anything, but to at least show him I was stronger of a person than this god-damn emotional child that I was before him.

“You really spilled your feelings to her? Nice one, Shakespeare.” Dean chimed in flashing a cheesy, yet arrogant grin, lifting himself off the unmade bed. I just wanted to slug him so hard and knock the living daylights out of him.

Sam grimaced from me to Dean, fighting back the tears that began to well-up in his bluish-gray eyes. I hated myself some much at that point, not for sleeping with both of them- I surely didn’t regret that- but the fact that I kept this all ‘hush-hush,’ not caring if this would cause a big blow up when it all came out; I screwed myself, I really did and there was no way I could fix it.

Rapidly, I witnessed Sam swinging his right arm back and colliding a fist with Dean’s jaw, making his brother flinch back in astonishment. It shocked me at first since it happened so quickly, but just like that Dean swiftly fought back, giving him a sock to the nose. This continued back and forth for a good minute until Dean was caught off guard and Sam grabbed him by the scruff of his jacket, sending into the glass frame of the painting from the museum. I stood up from the edge of the bed, shaking like a tower of Jenga blocks as managed to shout them to stop fighting. If anything, I was the one that deserved the beating, not them.

Dean helplessly rolled around on the floor, blood oozing from cuts to the forehead when his face collided with the glass on the painting. Sam stared down at him, huffing heavily with anger in every breath he took. His appearance was aggravated, furious, but deep down he was just downright vulnerable. His eyes shifted back at me, turning away from his brother’s battered body lying powerless on the floor. Sam didn’t say one word, but grab his brown jacket off the coat rack in the corner of the room and stomped out, slamming the motel door shut with force.