If Sam noticed how weird you had been acting for weeks, he didn't say anything. Not at first.

It was the way your gaze snagged on empty corners of motel rooms, the way your shoulders tensed when there was nothing there, the way your breathing went shallow at night like you were bracing for something that never came; until it would. He’d spent his life cataloging signs of possession, psychic breaks, trauma responses, and impending supernatural doom, and this… this fit a pattern he hated knowing by heart.

A year ago, Dean had died. Flatlined, gone, no miracles possible. And somehow, impossibly, he was back; alive, loud, whole while you had gone quiet.

Sam remembered the night too clearly: the frantic research, the blood on the floor, the hours lost to panic, you disappearing for hours with tears rolling down your cheeks. He also remembered you standing just outside the room when Dean came back suddenly, relief breaking you open so fast you had to look away.

At the time, Sam had been too busy thanking every god, demon, and cosmic accident he could think of to question it. Now he questioned everything.

He was currently watching you from across the motel room as you froze mid-step, eyes tracking something invisible along the ceiling. Your hand twitched, fingers curling like you wanted to grab a weapon that wouldn’t help. Hellhounds were cruel like that; silent, unseen, patient. Sam’s chest tightened as recognition slammed into him with brutal clarity.

Deals didn’t come free. And Winchester miracles always came with blood on the receipt.

His research notebook lay open on the bed, pages worn thin from overuse, symbols half-erased where he’d rubbed them out in frustration. He didn’t need to look at it now, he knew the timeline. One year, that's all you had gotten. Exactly one year since Dean’s death, exactly one year since he’d noticed you starting to flinch at nothing.

Sam stood slowly, careful not to startle you, heart pounding hard enough to drown out the hum of the ice machine outside. Every instinct screamed denial not you, please not you but instinct had never saved his family before. Truth was the only thing that ever stood a chance.

He took a step closer, voice steady by sheer force of will, eyes locked on yours as if grounding you might keep the unseen at bay.

“You’re having hallucinations, aren’t you?” Sam said quietly, then swallowed, jaw tightening as the implication settled heavy between you. “When did it start... and what did you do to bring Dean back?”

He wanted to beg, to scream at how stupid you had been to do that, but for now, all he wanted was to protect you from the doom lurking.