The leather felt rough beneath her fingertips, weathered and worn with age, no longer smooth like it was back when she first found the journal tucked away in a trunk; the initials, H.W., stood out to her and piqued her interest, and she held it up to him, "What is this?" before he flushed and took it from her with a muttered reply "Just one of my dad's old things".

"Maybe you should use it," she suggested, "it might help you to work some things out... if you can't talk to me, you could write it down."

He scowled, tossing the journal back into the trunk. "I meant to throw it away a long time ago."

But he never did.

Mary bit her lip, her eyes burning as she opened the cover and saw the ribbons pinned to the inside; the Expert badge he earned shooting his rifle, that one he was proud of, but the others, she was surprised he even kept them. The Bronze Star, she read the letter detailing the battle he was given the ribbon for, how he and his men fought for hours, pinned down, with little hope of surviving. She knew how he despised being given an award when so many others came home in body bags. "I didn't do anything special, I was just lucky... " he insisted, in a letter he wrote to her, laying on a cot in a makeshift hospital in the middle of the jungle. His "lucky" earned him a Purple Heart. She still vividly remembered the fear that made her blood run cold when she realized he could have been one of the boys lying in a flag draped coffin... John could have died.

John is dead.

Oh my god. John is dead. He's dead. My husband is dead.

Hot tears ran down her cheeks as she pulled the journal close and held it to her chest, fresh grief overcoming her, tightening her throat. It still didn't feel real. One moment she was a young mother, she had a loving husband, two beautiful boys... the life she always wanted; and the next she was standing in the middle of a forest, cold and alone, terrified. Then there was Dean, no longer four years older, but now a man even older than her; and he was telling her all these terrible things, Sam had been taken and he didn't know where, John was dead, and had been for years.

She wanted to ask him questions, so many questions, but when he spoke, it frightened her more than anything else ever had; he was her son, but he was a stranger, and he had lived a life that she couldn't comprehend. And when he spoke of John... it didn't sound like the John she knew at all.

But they had more important things to worry about, more important than details of the past. Sam... her baby boy, if she thought it was shocking to see Dean, than it was even more so to see Sam, bloodied and beaten, and unrecognizable. Six months of rocking him to sleep and nursing him meant nothing anymore. She loved him, of course, as much as the day she gave birth to him... but would she ever feel like is mother again? Or Dean's?

Once they had gotten Sam back and he was on his way to recovery, she tried to broach the subject of their childhood, and John, again. "Maybe you should read this," Dean offered, passing the journal across the table where they were sitting. "Fill in the blanks."

So there she was sitting at a desk in her darkened room in the bunker, caressing the leather bound journal that containing 30 years worth of answers to her desperate questions. What happened to her husband? What happened to her children? It was all right there in front of her, and yet, she was so scared to look.

She flipped over the page.

November 6, 1983

I buried my wife today. Even as I write that down, I don't believe it. Last week, we were a normal family… eating dinner, going to Dean's T-ball game, buying toys for baby Sammy. But in an instant, it all changed… when I try to think back, get it straight in my head… I feel like I'm going crazy. Like someone ripped both my arms off, plucked my eyes out… I'm wandering around, alone and lost and I can't do anything.

November 13, 1983

Nothing makes any sense anymore… my wife is gone, my sons are without their mother… the things I saw that night. I remember hearing Mary scream, and I ran, but then… everything was calm, for just a second – Sammy was fine – and I was sure I h ad been hearing things – too many horror movies too late at night. But then there was the blood, and when I looked up, my wife….

November 30th, 1983

I keep going over that night in my head… why did I ever get out of bed? I'm so sorry, Mary. I'm so sorry I let this happen to you. Can you ever forgive me? What can I do to get rid of this pain?

January 1st, 1984

This year I'm making a resolution. I'm going to find out what happened to my wife.

Page after page it went on, John's grief intensifying and evolving, his rage getting darker, and his distance from the boys growing. She read about Dean crawling into Sam's crib and holding him all night, how he didn't speak for months, and how they packed what little they had and left Kansas. She read about John trying to cram a lifetime's worth of knowledge and experience into his head in such a short time, and how he watched even more people he cared about die.

Then the hunt in Wisconsin, John left the boys alone in a motel room, Dean barely big enough to hold a gun and Sam too young to even read. It baffled her, trying to reconcile the John she knew, who stood by his baby boy's crib for hours, unwilling to let him sleep alone because he just didn't want to stop looking at him... with the John in the pages, who left his boys alone, in danger.

May 2nd, 1988

I could blame Dean, but it's my fault. There's enough blame to go around. I missed the kill, and I left Dean watching Sam, and he couldn't pull the trigger when he needed to. I haven't taught him well enough. If he is weak like that again, my boys will die…but what kind of father am I to put a nine-year-old boy in a situation where he might have to kill to protect his brother?

Sam's 5th birthday. Less than 5 years after her... (after I died) and John had already become someone she could barely recognize.

But there were flashes of her John too... July 4th, 1989, he got the boys into a day camp in Blue Earth, Minnesota, so they could be "regular kids" for awhile. He wanted better for them. But then Dean was attacked, a child and a camp counselor were killed, and another glimmer of normalcy was shattered.

Still, John kept trying, and Mary's heart ached with both love and pain as she read how John and the boys settled down in Arizona for a few months in 1991. Dean was playing baseball, Sam was thriving in school, and John was working a normal job; and then Sam was being kidnapped by his teacher, and they were running again.

Dean was twelve years old the first time he killed a man, just a few months after they left Arizona.

April 20th, 1991

It was Dean who killed Anderson. My oldest son is blooded. All I ever write about is death. Because all I ever see is death, and you know what? I did that to myself. It's got to end, but it can't end until I settle what happened to Mary.

Sam was nine when John gave him a .45 to put under his pillow while he slept.

June 21st, 1992

I don't think I'll win any awards from parenting organizations, but five nights running now Sammy has slept without nightmares. Sometimes a .45 under your pillow is all you need.

Mary took a deep breath and closed the journal. That was enough for one night. She stood up and took off the oversized coat Dean had given her, slipped her feet out of the clunky boots, and crawled into bed, pulling the scratchy blanket up to her chin. In the distance, she heard the deep rumble of Dean's voice, and it sounded so much like John; she closed her eyes and tried to imagine the room around her transforming, tried to believe that her husband- the sweet, gentle man she knew -was down the hall, and would be joining her soon.

She woke in the middle of the night, jumping out of a nightmare with a startled cry and flinging the blankets off as she sat up, instinctively reaching out for her husband, and finding the space next to her on the bed empty. Oh. She remembered now, the fog in her mind clearing as the room came into focus.

It was hot, but she shivered in spite of herself, even as the memories of the flames biting at her skin still lingered from her sleep; the pain she felt from having her stomach sliced open and her body pinned to the ceiling didn't compare to the way she felt as she began to smell her own flesh burning. Or the horror that sank in as she watched helplessly, unable to make a sound, while John checked on Sam and smiled to himself, believing everything was peaceful. She could still see the expression on his face when he turned and saw her...

It was a good thing there was a waste basket right next to the bed, as Mary suddenly gagged; she grabbed the basket, dry heaving violently, trying desperately not to make too much sound so nobody would come check on her. A few minutes passed and her stomach settled, and no shadows crossed over the other side of her door, no one had heard her.

Sleep wouldn't come again that night, she was sure of that, so she got a glass of water and curled up in bed with the journal, bracing herself for another look.

May 2, 1995
Sammy is twelve years old today. He's a handful. Spends all of his time on the computer, unless he's arguing with me. I can't understand him, and he doesn't try to understand me. Typical father-son trouble, but it feels worse because neither one of us can talk about what happened to his mother. He wants to be in one place, live a normal life. The older he gets, the more he wants it. But the older he gets, the more I'm going to need him to help on the hunt. He's got to understand that. We will finish this quest, and he's going to be a part of it.

Jan. 24, 1996

Dean turns seventeen today. We went shooting. Then I sent him out on his first hunt. I've let him take the lead before, but I've always been there to back him up. This time he's on his own.

Nov. 2, 1996

Mary has been dead for thirteen years. Longer than I knew her. What does it say about me that I've devoted more of my life to her death than I ever did to her life?

Jan. 24, 1998

Dean's nineteenth. I was coming home from Vietnam right after my nineteenth. Dean's war isn't going to end like that. Had a dream last night that I found Mary's murderer, and knew that I would have to die to take him out. That's all right if it protects the boys.

May 2, 2001

Sammy is eighteen years old today. Surprised he didn't take off. We're not getting along too well. He hunts when we need him to, but he's never committed himself the way Dean did.

March 8, 2002

Sam told me and Dean today that he is going to Stanford. I told him that if he goes, he better stay gone.

Aug. 31

Sam left. I told him that if he was going, it was permanent. I meant it.

"John..."

This couldn't be the same man she knew, not the John she loved, the man who would do anything for his family; the man who set aside some of the little money he made every week, just to be sure his sons would have better opportunities than he did.

"College was never in the cards for me," he said, "you play the hand you're dealt in life... I'm just gonna make sure the deck is stacked in their favor."

He would skip lunch every day to make sure he had enough money left at the end of the week to put into savings, even after Sam was born, when money got tighter, he remained determined.

How could that be the same man who threw Sam out of his life for doing the very thing he always dreamed his sons would? John's words enraged her, fresh tears springing to her eyes and her hands clenching the journal tightly, it wasn't enough that her husband was dead, her sons were strangers, life as she knew it was gone forever... she felt betrayed, like she never knew John at all.

How could he do this!?

Hands trembling, she flipped through the last few pages of the journal, reading frantically just as John's writings grew more frenzied, leads beginning to pour in. It ended abruptly, before she was ready, and she felt the sucker punch of his death all over again as she sat and stared at the last words he wrote:

Oct. 28, 2005

Got a phone call from the roadhouse, and the last piece fell into place. I'm on the trail. Twenty-two years, and I've finally found the son of a bitch. Now I'm going to take him down.

Dean turned as he poured the coffee into his mug, and then cursed when he jumped at the sight of his mother standing in the doorway, causing the hot liquid to splash over the rim of the cup and onto his hand. He set the pot and cup down quickly, and brought his hand up to his mouth to lick the coffee off, before stopping and reconsidering the action.

"Sorry," Mary said, softly.

Dean grabbed a towel and wiped his hand, shrugging. "Just... kind of a surprise, seeing you." He shook his head, laughing a little. "I don't know if that's ever gonna wear off."

Mary nodded her understanding, coming over to pour her own cup of coffee and taking a seat at the table. "Is Sam here?" she asked.

"Said he was going out for a jog." Dean rolled his eyes, "'cuz that's what he needs. He should be stumbling back in pretty soon."

Mary lifted the cup, inhaled the scent of the coffee, and then set it back down. "I read the journal."

"The whole thing?"

"Yes."

"You might've been better off taking it slow," Dean said, "maybe like a page a day. Probably a lot for you to take in right now."

"It's better than not knowing."

They sat in silence for a minute, neither one sure how to continue with the conversation, before Mary finally spoke up. "I can't believe my John wrote that."

Dean fiddled with the edge of the countertop for a second, he was used to approaching conversations about his dad with some wariness, whether he was talking to Sam, or Bobby, or even his own father, years before Dean was born. "I guess he didn't seem much like the guy you knew," he said.

"Glimpses of him... when he talked about you boys, sometimes I could still hear his voice, how much he loved you. But then, the things he put you through, being alone so much, and hunting, what he did when Sam went to school." Mary rubbed her forehead with the tips of her fingers, her eyebrows pulling together. "It's hard to make sense of it all."

"Dad wasn't perfect, but he did what he could."

Sam came walking briskly into the kitchen then, his hair stuck to his sweaty forehead, breathing heavily; he hesitated, looked at Mary, then at Dean, whether he was sensing some kind of tension or just reacting to seeing his mother was impossible to tell.

"Don't you think about a week's worth of sleep and a six-pack would do you more good than a jog?" Dean smirked over at Sam.

"For you, maybe," Sam replied, refilling his water bottle in the sink. He turned and leaned with his back against the counter, sipping the water, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Dean. "Something going on?"

Dean and Mary exchanged looks. "She read the journal," he said.

"Got it." Sam grimaced. "That's always... sobering."

"I never wanted this for you," Mary said, "all my life, I dreamed of having a family... I just wanted you to be safe, away from this life. And he raised you to be hunters."

"Well, I don't think this is the kind of life he imagined us having either," Dean replied, "but you make the most of the cards you're dealt. You read the journal, so you should know he was dealt a pretty shitty hand."

Mary stared at Dean, and for one horrible second he thought she might cry, but then her face twisted into an odd smile, then broke into a harsh laugh as she looked down and shook her head. "Now you sound just like him."

"Look," Sam said, pulling up a chair at the table, "Dad and I... we had our issues, we got so good at butting heads I still manage to do it with him now. But I worked through it. I forgave him. It took me awhile, but I got there."

"He did the best he could," Dean said.

"What if his best wasn't good enough?" Mary asked, looking from one son to the other.

"That doesn't mean it wasn't his best," Sam answered. "And, you know, we've had... more than a lifetime to come to terms with Dad, what happened to us, so maybe it'll take you some time."

"What... "Mary paused, as if questioning her next words, "what happened to him?"

"He saved my life," Dean said, "I was as good as dead... he made a deal. Same demon that killed you. Dad gave him the Colt and his soul, so he'd bring me back."

"Oh my god. He's... in hell?"

"No," Sam said, quickly, "he got out. Long story but, um, the gates of hell were opened and Dad climbed out."

"He helped us finally kill that son of a bitch too," Dean said.

"And then he just, disappeared." Sam shook his head. "I guess we don't know for sure where he ended up, but he got out of hell."

"Maybe he took it too far sometimes, when we were kids," Dean admitted. Ten years ago, he'd have been hard pressed to admit his father had any faults, but the days of hero worship had long since passed. "But he thought he was doing what he had to. We couldn't just pretend to be a normal family, act like there wasn't something out there that was probably gonna try to kill us someday... we'd be dead right now if it wasn't for what he taught us."

Mary sighed, bringing her hand to her head again. "It's just that... you deserved so much better than this." Her hand dropped and she began to twist the wedding band around her finger. "So did he. I can blame him for his mistakes, but I could never hate him... and the truth is, I made that deal. I knew all about it, and I did nothing to warn him, protect him." She wiped furiously at the tears that crept out of her eyes. "The person I should be blaming is myself. I did this to you."

"You were a scared teenage girl," Sam said, "and you'd just lost everyone you loved. Nobody could blame you for making that deal."

"But afterward, I should have done something," Mary argued, "I should have stopped it. Instead I just- buried my head in the sand. I didn't want to face it."

"So you're not perfect either." Dean offered her a crooked smile. "You really are part of the family."

"And making deals with demons." Sam laughed. "That's just... family tradition at this point."

"This whole thing is too big to put on one person," Dean said, "it's not your fault. It's not Dad's fault. Maybe you two both did things you shouldn't have, or didn't do things you should've... it's done now. We've just gotta make peace with it and try to move on."

"Besides," Dean said, "it wasn't all bad."

"Just," Sam said, "like ninety percent of it."

A beat of silence, and then they all began to laugh, quietly at first, and then louder as the other's laughter encouraged each of them.

They spent the day together, the boys answering all of Mary's questions, at times brutally honestly; Sam's hurt and anger over John's reaction to him going to school, the horrible secret he told Dean right before he died, both boys going to hell, the Apocalypse, the horror went on and on. But still, they smiled when they talked about the pranks they played on each other, even one time they played them on their dad; how Bobby Singer stepped in when they lost their dad, and they needed someone; Castiel, Jody, Charlie, and other friends they'd made- and sometimes lost -along the way.

That night, Mary got back into bed, and fought the urge to look for John at her side, while she again took the journal and opened it.

Jan. 24
Dean turns eight today. Second grade is treating him well. I hope we can stay. He's at school, and they're going to have a little party for him. Then when he gets home, we're going to do the family thing. We're going to Chuck E. Cheese's, and we'll eat pizza and play video games until the kids go nuts.

May 2
Sammy is eight years old today. Happy birthday, kiddo. No matter what the demons and soothsayers and lunatic albinos say, you're special to me just because you're my son. And I'm never going to let anything happen to you.

Nov. 13
Sammy's soccer team won a division championship. On to the state playoffs. I'm proud as hell of him.

The words still hurt, still angered her, and she still felt a vast divide between herself and the man behind the pen; understanding would come later, forgiveness even later than that, for now all she could do was accept it.

And try to find the good.