Sam’s finally something like steady (or, at least, he could pass himself off as steady if the person he was trying to act for was half blind, maybe, but John Winchester isn’t even remotely blind except for the ways that he is, anyway so it’s probably pretty easy to see through), manages to hold that as long as possible after Dean moves away. Then Dad’s there, looking at him, inspecting him, and he knows he’s doing a really bad job at trying to look normal and okay. He grits his teeth and tries to stand a little straighter, to hold still and stop shaking, and then he’s pulled into a hug before he really has time to realize what’s going on.
He just sort of freezes at first, and by the time he’s thought to hug back his father’s moving away and back to business as usual, more orders and it feels like Sam’s head is spinning as Dad brushes out of the room and Dean follows. He stays standing for as long as he can, to make sure they’re really going and that Dad isn’t going to turn back around and come in and see Sam sitting and start yelling again.
>>“Well, uh, shit,” Jo’s standing there looking a little blown away, and he manages a laugh that sounds more like a sigh and gives in to his body’s need to be off his feet, sinking down onto the mattress and dragging the blanket back up around himself again. He won’t lie down, not if he only has ten minutes (even though ten minutes more of rest would be amazing) - he’ll never get himself back out of bed if he does that.
“Now you get why we were confused by your description of him, before, right?” He sounds like a sulking child, and he knows it, but she’s seen him at damn near his worst (okay, he’s pretty sure it genuinely was his worst), and so he doesn’t really care.