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Their original appointment for the ultrasound was on a Tuesday. After a brief hesitation, he makes her reschedule it.
Sam never asked him to, but he knows that whenever he could, Dean would automatically adjust the stupid incidental things like that in their lives, for Sam. Even after 13 years, he still kind of hated Tuesdays.
The number of times in a day, in a week, that he finds himself brought up short and facing what he’s lost, is endless. In this case it’s the awareness, and deep-down understanding that had been between them. He never truly recognized how much they did for each other, instinctually, silently. Why would he have to? They spent over 35 years molding their edges to fit. Every time he’s faced with another piece of life that he has to relearn, it’s a sharp shock down his spine as he recognizes, oh. Dean made this better. Dean did this so I didn't have to. Dean carried this half for me. All those edges now are exposed and he keeps running into them. He's constantly bleeding, bruised.
The new appointment is on a Friday. Her grateful smile once he confirms he’ll be there lets him feel less guilty about the initial demand. The entire situation is made up of stutter steps and awkward negotiations. He wants to be a father but he's a newly retired hunter and she was the last person he saved. Their initial connection was a cliché of a one-night stand resulting in an accidental baby. This was never something he imagined happening to him. Maybe to Dean, when they were younger. They are working to get to know each other, so they can do this together but still, it’s not easy.
Once they arrive, he keeps getting called variations on husband and father. The receptionist assumes they're married. The tech calls him daddy once she gets started. It's a funhouse mirror scene. He's not these things now. But he was, or it felt like he was, even if not officially, two, three years ago. And somehow now he's going to be a father again. It’s like something between a dream and a nightmare.
A small piece of him dimmed when the tech tells them the gender. He'd been imagining a girl, and the thought of it being so unknown was comforting. He has no idea what he'd do with a girl. He's not unhappy that the baby's a boy. He's knows he's not. But he is something. He’d been hoping for that newness, something that wouldn’t be as easy to draw parallels to.
After, he takes her to dinner to celebrate. She's lit up with excitement, the baby is healthy, she's always wanted a son. He swings back and forth with her, happy about the normal prognosis, still fighting with himself about how he's feeling otherwise. When he drops her off after, she kisses his cheek before she gets out of the Impala and says, "Let's name him after your brother. I've always liked the name Dean."
It's a near thing, but thankfully she misses how he completely shuts down. Something like luck, that she'd already turned to open the door. She's calling out a good night and "Think about it!" before he can get a handle on responding. If Dean were there, he'd be murdering him for how hard he's gripping and twisting the steering wheel. It takes him a few minutes to start breathing normally, to be able to drive Baby safely enough to get back home.
Instead of the beer he'd been planning on, to finish off his night, he breaks out the whiskey and drinks himself to unconsciousness. He hadn't thought about a name. His son will need a name. It's suddenly real in a way that it wasn't before. It hurts too much and all he wants to do is share this with his brother. Dean wouldn't really be comfortable having a conversation about something like this, but he would suffer through it for Sam.
Sam spends a week or two painfully thinking around the idea. She keeps bringing it up. They haven't seen each other in person recently, and he’d been able to put her off, but he won’t be able to forever.
He can’t explain to her why he doesn’t want to name their son after Dean. She's been trying so hard to involve him. Every day there's a new text with a way help pull him into the process. He told her he wanted to be there and he meant it. But the name thing has set him back. It might get better when the baby arrives, but now he's stuck in his head, feeling the loss fresh from a new angle. This time, he doesn't have the rush or mystery of hunts to help him bury it all down.
How can he explain why he can’t imagine calling anyone else in this world Dean? How many conversations did they have by just saying each other’s names? Dean was possibly the single most spoken word of his life, up until 17 months ago. Now just thinking the name hurts, and even all these months later, it's like chewing glass to try and speak it out loud.
If he hadn't been injured in that last hunt, and stoned on pain medication after, she never would have known Dean's name and this wouldn't have been an issue.
Sam knows though, that there is no one in the world who he'd want to honor more. His brother, who wholeheartedly devoted his entire life to raising, protecting, and loving Sam. And not just Sam. Ben and Jack too, even for the brief periods of times he had the chance. Dean deserves it, is the thing.
She finally pins him down when he comes over to help her pack up her spare room, so they can start putting the nursery together.
He tries tell her why he's been avoiding the conversation, voice cracked and low. There's no real way to ever explain to someone, not even to Jody or Donna, who knew him, what it's like for Sam to be here without his brother. He's a broken half of something, and he’s certain there’s no recovery from that. He won’t ever feel whole again.
He tells her that he doesn't think there's room in him for another Dean; that he's not sure it would be fair to any of them. Dean can't be overwritten. That while he does like the idea, he hates it more. The declaration makes her stop what she's doing, and stare at him hard. He bears the gaze and keeps pulling books off the shelf. There isn't more he can or would say.
After a tense few minutes she sits down on the bed and quietly asks, "What would you name him then?" He stares into the box he's packing, struck dumb by the question, with his gut twisted up, and leaden.
Son of a bitch. Now that they've discussed it, he's not sure he could name him anything else. Would anything seem right, even while Dean still seems wrong? She seems to recognize his lack of response for what it is, and doesn't ask anything else. They finish packing in silence.
Somehow, she talks him into staying for dinner, even after the deadlock. It's quiet, and less uncomfortable than he would have thought. Sam hopes they'll continue to be able to get along like this, once the baby comes.
"What about a nickname, he could be named for Dean, but called by his middle name? My father's name was Jonathan. And we can call him Jon, or Johnny?" The suggestion comes with coffee, after a meal better than anything Sam could have made on his own.
He's frozen with disbelief for a moment, and he knows he startles her when he breaks into manic laughter. Damn their father's extremely common name and its variations.
Compared to trying to discuss Dean, it's so much easier to explain that his father's name was John and that while he loved him, there's too much history to want to call his son that. Who doesn't have father issues anyway, these days. She listens to his explanation with a raised brow and somewhat ill grace.
He’s clearly reached the end of her patience, and he doesn't blame her. He clarifies that as long as it isn’t a nickname, he actually likes Jonathan for the middle name, in honor of both grandfathers. He hadn't considered middle names at all. He and Dean didn't have any and he rarely thought about it or cared. It was just one more way they were different from everyone else, yet similar to each other.
That still leaves them at a standstill on the first name. How could it be Dean? How could it not? He doesn't want to think about this much anymore. He’s scraped open and raw. Maybe he should just name him Garth, since one of his twins was named Sam. The thought is so ridiculous that he barely has it before huffing out a laugh again. But it also makes him think. He has a namesake. Even Cas does. At the time it had been funny that Dean was left out. Now though. It's not funny now and the thought burns cold in his chest.
He tries the full thing out loud, Dean Jonathan Winchester. Still difficult, not pain free, but it is the easiest he’s said his brother's name in 17 months, give or take a day. Maybe he could do it, separate the two, and not flinch.
She blinks, surprised he's still entertaining the idea, and says off handedly, "We could always call him DJ?"
And Sam smiles.