This is a disclaimer.

AN: Sorry about this, guys, but the Pathways 'verse just won't leave me alone…

Talk about tomorrow

Having a mother who was essentially immortal had advantages Dean had never envisioned.

Her choices of friends, for example. Anansi threw the greatest parties in this or any other plane of existence.

Unfortunately, they also came with pretty horrendous hangovers.

"It serves you right," Sam said pitilessly, drumming his thumbs on the steering-wheel.

"Shut up, Sammy. I've earned it."

"The party or the hangover?"

"Both. Why didn't you come?"

"Well, excuse me for having trouble forgetting how he killed you," Sam huffed. Dean rolled his eyes behind his sunglasses.

"Dude, you think about this stuff too much. Last year oughta stay in last year, you know? The guy's a blast. And he's a friend of Mom's."

"Mom's as crazy as you are," Sam said dryly.

There was no denying that, Dean had to admit. They were on their way to meet Mom now; she'd left them in New Jersey for a few days to 'go take care of some stuff now that everything's over'. Dean hadn't said anything, but he suspected it had something to do with Dad. She hadn't had the time to mourn him the way he and Sammy had, and he wouldn't be surprised if she'd spent the last two weeks in a motel somewhere crying for him. Maybe she'd even gone back to Lawrence.

But Mary Winchester was as calm and composed as ever when her sons sauntered into the diner they were meeting in. She also looked more tanned and healthier than she ever had since Black Rock. Getting her off that damn potion Ruby had given her and into hospital had taken all her sons' considerable skills of persuasion, but it had been worth it to see her well again.

"Tell me that sucky Ford thing outside isn't yours," Dean said by way of greeting as he fell into the booth opposite her.

"Legally, no," Mom answered. "Tell me you didn't spend most of last night chatting up Jenny? Hi, Sammy."

"Hey, Mom. You OK?" Sam bent to kiss her cheek; she smiled at him. "Yup."

"Maybe I did," Dean grinned, pushing his sunglasses up his nose. "What about it?"

"She's a huldra, Dean."

"They don't kill people!"

"He's pretty hyper for a kid with a hangover," Mom said to Sam, who grinned. "Six mugs of coffee. Before ten o'clock."

"My God. Aren't there drug laws against that sort of thing?"

"You guys," Dean said petulantly. "I can leave if you're gonna be doing this all day."

Mom laughed. "Oh, that's alright. We're perfectly comfortable." She waited until they'd all ordered breakfast ("Hangover cure, please," Dean had said with a charming smile, and the waitress had melted into a puddle of goo) before reaching over and tugging Dean's sunglasses off.

"You're not Bono, and that's just rude," she said, waving them under his nose.

Sam snickered, but it died away when he saw the thin chain that fell out of Mom's t-shirt as she sat back.

Dad's dog tags.

Dean had none of his brother's qualms about bringing them up.

"Bit morbid, going back there," he said.

"I didn't," Mom admitted. "Just did a finding. It's just – I don't have my wedding ring anymore."

The boys exchanged a silent look. Dean had flatly refused to take Dad's ring when they burned his body; now, he wished they'd kept it to give to Mom.

She nudged his ankle with her foot.

"I'm glad you didn't take John's. He would have wanted to be burned with it no matter what. Selfish like that."

It was the first time they'd seen her speak of Dad with a grin and a bubble of laughter in her voice rather than grief, another little flash of the girl Dad had fallen in love with rather than the determined hunter that had faced down Lilith herself and won.