This is a disclaimer.
AN: This was written as part of the Ares and Artemis 'verse, but there's only a short few sentences that give that away, and aren't very AU at all.
Look to the future now
Christmas dawned in the Winchester household with an ear-splitting yell, and the sound of someone bolting along the upstairs corridor. A bang, as a door was slammed off its hinges, and then a small body jumped on John Winchester with another gleeful shriek.
"Daddy! Presents!"
"Good for you," John groaned, rolling over and thereby spilling his hyperactive son into the space between him and his wife. "Now go back to sleep."
"But presents, Daddy!" Dean protested, sitting up all tousle-haired and red-faced, looking so adorable that Mary had to reach up and pull him under the covers with her.
"Don't mind him, my darling boy. He doesn't understand about presents."
John gave her a disbelieving look. He had, after all, spent all last evening helping her get everything ready for today. And after that… well, he definitely wasn't going there with Dean still in the bed with them. Mary blew him a kiss over their son's head, laughing. He was pretty sure she knew what he was thinking about.
Dean was wriggling like an eel in her arms, excitement radiating off him. "Can I open them? Please? Please?"
"Fine," Mary said, releasing him with a laugh. "Go fetch me my dressing gown, would you?"
"But what about sleep," John protested again. "It's half past six!"
"You don't come now, you don't get presents," his wife said firmly.
John groaned.
A while later, Dean was happily absorbed in a Duplo set, wrapping paper and chocolate bars strewn across the floor around him. John was watching him through the lounge window, having been banished to the porch with his coffee. Mary couldn't stand the smell of it while she was pregnant. Still, once he was finished, she joined him outside, robe tightly wrapped around herself, and hurried into his arms.
He thought he could spend the rest of his life like this, right here on this freezing porch, holding her against him and watching their son play over the top of her golden head.
She pulled away from him slightly so she could look up at him, smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.
"Merry Christmas," she told him.
He bent and kissed her, long and lingering. "Merry Christmas," he breathed against her lips when they drew apart. Then he pulled further back and laid a hand on the swell of her belly. "To you too," he told the baby, mouth twitching.
"Names," Mary said, resting her forehead against his shoulder. "We need to think of names."
"Baby's not even due till May," John laughed.
"Admittedly," Mary agreed. "But imagine telling him we named him on Christmas Day!"
"Him?"
"Definitely. Dean says so. He's adamant. No girls in this house."
"He'll change his tune by the time he's thirteen."
"Yeah, but that'll be your problem, Johnny. My problem is that I don't want to spend another four months calling our son 'baby'."
John sighed. He knew that look she was wearing, that speculative look made up of narrowed eyes and an arched eyebrow and a slightly mischievous smile and the way she caught the left corner of her bottom lip between her teeth.
"You've already chosen one, haven't you?" he said.
Her lip slid out from between her teeth, and her smile grew. "Just the first one. And you did pick 'Dean Alexander'."
"True. What is it?" he asked.
"Samuel," she said promptly.
"Samuel," he repeated, turning it over in his mind. "Samuel Winchester. Hm."
"It's perfect, Johnny. We'll call him Sam, of course. Sammy, even. It has a certain tradition in my family, as you well know. And it's nice and normal, you know? Not long or pretentious or anything. Like 'Dean' and 'John'."
"Unlike 'Marianna Victoria'?" he teased.
Mary poked him in the ribs. "You promised never to speak those syllables aloud again after our wedding day," she accused.
John grinned, totally unrepentant. "Sorry. And you're right. Samuel's a good name. But if it is a girl?"
"Samantha?"
"Sammy either way, then. I like it."
"Thought you might."
They stood there for a few moments, just looking at each other, drinking it all in.
Happiness.
"Lets take a road trip," he suggested suddenly. She smiled.
"For Dean's birthday?"
"Somewhere with a beach."
"New Orleans. If we take him to Florida, he'll get eaten by an alligator the minute we turn our backs."
"Probably, yeah."
They were kissing again when Dean clambered up onto the back of the sofa and started tapping on the window, demanding his parents come back inside and play with him.