Disclaimer: The characters of Supernatural do not belong to me.

A/N: For my regular Evy readers-I have not forgotten about Evy. My muse has just been working in different directions for a while. I do have a new Evy story planned, but this one and the others I've written lately have been pulling at my writing brain more lately. I am still working on Never Say Never Again, but I can't promise when that one will be done.

John Winchester had been haunted by many things in his life. The jungles of Vietnam, the death of his wife Mary, ghosts, werewolves, demons, and other things that most people could only dream about being real. He had mostly learned to deal with the things that haunted him, and for the last few years, he had lived a somewhat normal, happy, apple pie life.

Five and a half years earlier, John had gone into the kitchen of the small, rundown house they lived in at the time. Sam was missing, and a grueling search was underway. Sam was found miles away, unconscious but unhurt. He remained that way for two weeks, until he finally woke up and came home.

One thing had come out of Sam's disappearance that John could still scarcely believe. Mary had come back to him, alive and well. Sam had claimed not to know anything about it, and John had chosen not to question him on it further. Their life after Sam came home from the hospital had been full of more joy, happiness, love, laughter, and, above all, peace than John had ever known before.

Suddenly, though, it had all come crashing down.

For the first two years after Mary had come back, Sam had been somewhat clingy with his mother. He rarely went anywhere, choosing instead to stay at home and talk with Mary. After a conversation with Sam about it not being healthy for him to be home so often, Sam had reluctantly begun to spend more time away, but when he was home, he very rarely was out of the eyeline of his mother, father, brother, or a combination of all three.

Then came the weekend that John would regret for the rest of eternity.

Sam began to get clingy again. He didn't want to leave home to go to classes, go to his job, hang out with friends, or hang out with his brother. Mary and John planned a weekend away, and Sam protested the trip. He begged his mom and dad to stay, claiming that he had a bad feeling something was going to happen. Mary had wanted to stay behind, worried that something really was wrong with Sam, but John had snapped at him to 'stop being selfish', and Sam had finally given up the fight. It was the look on Sam's face that John would never be able to shake. Dean had been out hunting, so Sam had the house to himself Saturday and most of Sunday.

He had never gotten to enjoy it. Because when they'd returned to the house late Sunday night, Mary had found Sam dead in his bed.

Ever since, John hadn't been able to sleep without nightmares. Sam would be in his dreams, standing far away from him, looking sad and crying. There were nights that Sam would be the age he'd been when he'd died, but on nights that were particularly cruel, Sam would be no older than seven. Usually, in the dreams, John would call him, beg him to come back, but Sam would just continue to walk away. But on the bad nights, the really bad nights, that led to him waking up and drinking, Sam would turn back and say to him some variation of I told you something bad would happen. Why didn't you listen to me? I died scared and all alone.

Then came the dreams that John was amazed didn't kill him in his sleep. He was walking down a path, looking for Sammy. He wasn't particularly worried, as Sam wasn't really late, but it was getting close to dinnertime and Sammy needed to come home. Finally, he'd spot six-year-old Sammy standing in the middle of the path. John would smile in relief, then start walking to him. But the second his feet would try to move after spotting Sammy, he'd be frozen in place. Sammy would start crying, and he'd move slowly further and further away. John would scream for him to come back, and Sammy would just cry and say I can't, Daddy. I told you something bad would happen. Now it's too late. He had only had that dream three times so far, but each time he had woken up screaming.

John hadn't even tried to sleep on this particular night. Sam had been dead exactly six months. The official diagnosis was an undiagnosed heart condition, which John thought was absolute garbage. There was a kind of sick irony to the fact that he couldn't sleep this night. Sam had been exactly six months old when Mary died, and he had fallen into a deep sleep downstairs. Dean was away from the house again. He hunted almost full-time now. He wasn't able to be home without drowning in grief about Sam. John didn't blame him. Were it not for Mary, John would no doubt have been right there with him. But he didn't do that. Instead, John came to a door that he hadn't opened since they'd burned Sam's body. He took the doorknob to Sam's room and opened it slowly. It was dark, but he didn't turn on the light. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, John sat on the edge of what before had been Sam's bed.

The room had a slightly musty smell to it, from not having been cleaned in months, and there were a couple of spiderwebs that John noticed, but otherwise it looked exactly the same. The linens on the bed were slightly ruffled, and the comforter was pulled back. There was a picture on Sam's nightstand. It had been taken the first Christmas the family spent together. Mary and John stood in front of the lit tree. John had both arms wrapped around Mary's waist, kissing her cheek and making her laugh. Mary had her arms around Sam, while Dean stood next to her, two fingers up behind Sam's head forming faux bunny ears. Sam's college textbooks were still on his desk, along with the remnants of the paper he'd been working on for a few weeks previous. His sneakers were at the foot of his bed, one sock inside each of them. The room was so well preserved that John believed Sam would walk through the door any second, flip the light on, and jump in fright at his father's unexpected appearance.

"John?"

John's heart began to race. Sammy? But it wasn't Sam. It was Mary, who had gotten out of bed to find him there.

"What are you doing?"

"Sorry." John said. "I couldn't sleep."

"Another dream?" Mary asked. She'd had her own dreams of Sam in the months since he'd died, but not nearly as often as John.

John shook his head. "No. I didn't even try to sleep."

"Why?" Mary asked.

John shrugged. "Just couldn't stop thinking about him all day."

Mary nodded. "Yeah."

"I miss him." John said, feeling stupid for being so obvious.

"I know." Mary said simply.

"I'm sorry I woke you up."

"You didn't. I wasn't sleeping either." Mary said.

She finally decided to break her resolve not to go into the room, and stepped inside and over to John. She joined him on the bed, and noticed all the things that John had before. She picked up the photo on Sam's nightstand and smiled. There was another version of the photo, but Sam had insisted on keeping this one.

"It's the realest happiness we've ever had, mom. I want to keep it."

She put the photo back on the nightstand, then turned to John. "Why don't we try to go to sleep together?"

John considered the offer, but Sammy's faint voice in the background of his mind stopped him. I can't Daddy. It's too late. "I'll be there soon. Would you mind if I sat in here for a while and just talked to him? Alone?"

Mary smiled sadly. John had always looked older than his years, but Sam's death seemed to have put ten years on him in just a few months. "Just promise me you won't stay in here all night."

"Promise."

"Okay." Mary stood up and took one last look at the photo. She kissed her middle and forefinger and then the Sammy in the picture. "Good night, angel. Mom loves you."

When Mary was gone, the wall John had put up started to crumble. He grabbed Sam's pillow and hugged it, burying his face inside it so he could let out a choked, muffled sob.

"I'm so sorry, Sammy. I'm so sorry, son."

When John felt hurt, or sad, or upset, or afraid, he normally expressed it with anger. But there was nowhere to turn the anger this time, except at himself. So he cried. He cried because Sammy, who had tried so hard to make John happy as a child and light his world when he lived in the darkness, had been told to 'stop being selfish' when he tried to grab a little of that light for himself. It was John that had been selfish. Not Sammy.

In the midst of his tears, John found something. Tucked away in the pillowcase. It felt like…a card? John stopped his tears and opened the pillowcase. Sure enough, he dug out two envelopes. John's heart lodged in his throat. Both of them were in Sammy's handwriting, one labeled 'Mom, Dad, and Dean' and the other simply labeled 'Dad'. With shaking fingers, John tore open the one labeled 'Dad' and put the other one aside.

Dear Dad,

It sounds cliché, but if you're reading this, it means I'm dead.

John's thoughts immediately started to rage. Had Sam really known what was going to happen?

I know you've got questions. I'm sure you've got a lot of them. I promise to answer at least some of them, but I need you to promise me something first. There's a spell on this letter. If you don't make the promise to me, you won't be able to read the rest of the letter. The promise is this. You can't, ever, for any reason, show this letter to mom and Dean. They have their own letter, with what I want them to know. And after you read this one, you have to burn it. If you want to read this one, say 'I promise'. If you make the promise, but aren't sincere about it, the letter will burn up in your hand. So take your time to decide what you want to do, Dad.

"I promise." John said. The rest of the paper, which had been blank, started to fill with Sam's writing. By the time John was done, he would wonder whether he had really made the right decision.

Okay. Here goes. The first thing I want to say to you, Dad, is this. I love you. I know we butted heads like bulls when I was growing up, but please don't ever doubt that. I love you. I love you so much. I always have, and alive, dead, or somewhere in between, I always will.

"Oh, Sammy." John said. "Sammy, I love you too."

The second is this. I forgive you. Despite what I may have said, I know you felt guilty leaving all the time for hunts. I'll be honest. It did hurt. I did think that you cared more for hunting than you did me. But, as I got older, I realized that you were just trying as hard as you could to protect us. That it would have killed you if something happened to us. And I'm sorry that I didn't appreciate you more. But Dad, I want you to know, I died knowing that you love and care about me, and that if you had to, you would've died to save me. Whatever words we had this weekend, I forgive you. For that, for everything.

John had to put the letter down and cry into the pillow again. He had wondered, every day since Sam died, what exactly he thought his father believed of him. He wonder if Sam knew that the thought of Sam going through any sort of pain made John hurt in ways that he didn't think were possible. If he knew how precious he was to John, how invaluable, how absolutely loved.

Dad, I want you to make another promise. This one's entirely optional. If you don't want to, you don't have to. The letter won't burn up or anything like that. But please, please don't go back to hunting. As much as I loved the man you were before, when you got back with mom, you completely changed. For the good. You were so much happier, so much more content, so much more at peace. Please stay with mom. Love her, cherish her, till death do you part. Please promise me, Dad.

"I will, Sammy."

I don't say this to make you feel bad, Dad. Please know that. But if Dean gets back into hunting, please try to keep him close to you. Don't let it consume him like it did you when we were kids. Don't let him lose what makes him the person he is now.

"I'll do my best." John said.

Finally, Dad, I need to confess something. I know I told you that I didn't know why mom was back. I lied.

"Sammy, what the hell did you do?" John asked.

I couldn't tell you when I was alive, because it means that mom would have dropped dead. Again. And I still would have been gone. Mom can NEVER know, or she'll die. Dad, the night we had that fight, before you guys found me at Bobby's, I traded my life for mom's.

"Son of a bitch." John said, and he had to put the letter aside again. More unbelievably strong emotions flooded through him. Anger was the most overwhelming. At Sam, for giving up his life as if it meant nothing. At himself, for driving Sam to do it. A sense of loss that was nothing compared to what he'd felt when Mary had died. And a part that John would never admit to-gratitude. Gratitude to Sam for giving back his love, his heart, his sweet Mary. With hands that shook even harder than before, John picked up the letter.

But before he started to read again, words that Bobby had said to him years earlier rang through his ears. Sam had been on his first hunt, at eleven years old, and had jumped in front of a ghost when John froze. Sammy had taken the brunt of the ghost's attack, leaving him with bruises all over his body, a broken arm, and a broken foot. His injuries meant he would be on bedrest for two months. Instead of being grateful, though, John had started lecturing Sammy on not following orders. A vicious fight ensued, and things were said that couldn't be taken back on both sides. Bobby had then said something that John initially ignored, but resonated with a truth that even he couldn't push aside now. After assuring Sam that what he had done was brave, he'd warned John,

"You ungrateful bastard. Sam would die for you. For both of you. I just hope it doesn't come to that before you start to appreciate him."

John had to push that thought aside. He continued with the letter.

I won't tell you how, although you'll probably figure it out in about five minutes anyway. But Dad, please don't make my sacrifice not mean anything. Don't sacrifice yourself to get me back. I did this for you, to make you happy. So don't waste it. Stay with mom, stay with Dean, and the three of you be a family.

I didn't tell you this to make you feel guilty, Dad, although I know you will. But I wanted you to know the truth. I know you wouldn't admit it, or maybe you didn't even realize it, but you thought I was trying to either take mom from you or hog her and keep her from you. I wasn't, Dad. It's just that, well, I gave you and mom forever. I just wanted my time with her while I had it.

A crashing sense of guilt overwhelmed John, and he nearly ripped the pillow that was still in his lap apart. He believed that Sam had forgiven him for the fight where they'd ended up having Mary back, but apparently the old saying was true. Ignorance genuinely is bliss. Had John known about Sam's sacrifice, the last five years would have been spent figuring out how to save Sam's life. Instead, it had been spent having holidays, birthday parties, dinners as a family, cheering Sam at soccer games, and all the other things that Sam had wanted growing up. Seeing Sam as happy as he was had, in turn, made John and Dean happy too.

There's not really anything else I can say, Dad. Please just take the gift I gave you and enjoy it. I love you, Dad. I hope you're happy now, and I hope you stay that way.

Much love,

Sam

John had made up his mind. He could never live with himself knowing that Sam had given his life for him. He knew if he just let it go, then every time he smiled, laughed, kissed Mary, talked to Dean, or even ate some of Sam's favorite foods, he would see Sam, crying and in pain while being tortured in hell. He had to do something for his baby boy. As he took the letters Sam had written, another thought occurred to him. He had wondered before if Sam understood how much his father loved him. Apparently, John had failed to realize how much Sam had loved him.

"That's about to change."

John found Mary sleeping in bed, and stared at her long and hard before making up his mind. He hadn't read Sam's letter to her, but if everything worked out, Mary wouldn't need it. So he placed them both in his pocket and leaned over to kiss her. He started to walk out, before he could change his mind, but turned at the door and stared at her another moment. He couldn't help but feel responsible for the entire mess. He had placed hunting over Sam's happiness, and as a result, Sam had given up everything for him. It was time to return the favor.

"I'm sorry, Mary."

John knew the ingredients well. He gathered them together, then drove miles out of town to find a crossroads. Just as the sun was beginning to come up, he looked at the demon who had appeared when summoned with a look of fiery determination. But when it sunk in who he was looking at, John's resolve faltered.

"Sammy?"