Author's Note: We don't own Supernatural or any of its characters, unfortunately.

I just want to thank sweetkiwi604 for co-writing this with me. She's my biggest supporter :)

Dear Adam,

Remember how you told me that I had to open different doors just to see what was behind them? Those were simpler times, weren't they? I know I hurt you, and I'm sorry. If you can't forgive me then I understand. But, not for nothing, I always thought that we'd last forever.

I wish you love and happiness, Adam. Honest I do.

-Eve

P.S. I love you.

Adam Milligan couldn't contemplate the number of empty reasons he kept re-reading her letter. At first it was a weightless weapon against all his self-doubt and loneliness. Now it had turned into a masochistic blade which he bared against his skin to release his pain that seemed to fester and boil against his throbbing heart.

He wandered through Bobby's cold, empty house, the silence so deafening, it seemed to echo through the halls and rooms with a resounding clang, the chill floating in the air derived from the hollow words that had passed between them during those last days, devoid of warmth or any of the emotions he once felt when he'd first met her.

He shook his head slightly but couldn't suppress the smile that came to his lips at the string of elegant words. Adam knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he loved her and had from the start. He'd been struck dumb when he accidentally rushed into her on his way to class that day and had sent up a silent thank you to whatever higher being was listening for putting her in his life.

***Flashback***

"You know the least you could do is go out for a beer, Milligan," Nate crumpled up a paper ball and threw it at Adam as he gathered his textbooks.

"I've got to get to class," Adam glanced at the clock on the wall at the other end of the large library, "Medical school's a pain in the ass, remember?"

"Exactly," Nate approached with a lazy grin, "That means you can take a break for a beer with your favorite roommate."

"You're my only roommate," Adam muttered, half-heartedly waving to his friend and running out to cut through the commons.

It had been an unusually cold day as he rushed from one class to the next trying desperately to shield his face from the sharp wind that could cut right through a body.

Medical school, especially the preclinical years, Adam realized, was one of the most stressful times in his life, and retrospectively he found it a comfort that he was not the only person dealing with that kind of pressure. School had always come easily to him. His mother was always working and his dad was never around for it to mean anything, so all Adam's attention would go toward studying.

The first year was the hardest for him. He could vividly recall how he had scored a 76% on his embryology exam in the very first semester at the University of Wisconsin. He had barely passed and seriously thought about a change in major but he could hear his mother's words in his head almost screaming at him for giving up on something he wanted and dreamed about. Things had gotten easier for the most part once freshman year was behind him and that alone had him breathing easier.

For a second he totally blanked out in his rush, being lost in his own thought, and he felt himself collide with someone else. Looking down instinctively, Adam saw textbooks and loose paper sprawled about the ground by his feet.

""I'm so sorry," he tried his best to gather as many pieces of paper he could slightly shaking them to make sure they hadn't gotten dirty, "I really should have been watching where I was going."

Hollow. That's how Adam felt the moment he looked up. A charmed smile played at the corners of his mouth which made his icy blue eyes glow.

"It's no bother, really. I'm Eve," she said with an outstretched hand.

***Present***

Dean's heavy hand clapped against Adam's shoulder, making the young Winchester shoot up from his daydreaming, "What's got you so jumpy?" Dean asked with a half-curious, half-bored tone.

"Nothing," Adam cleared his throat, shoving his fists into his pockets.

Dean thrust his thumb behind his shoulder deciding not to press the subject, "Sam and I were going to the bar to get a drink. You interested?"

Adam silently nodded, his fingers gripping the letter that he held in a tight ball before shoving in back in his wallet where he had kept it since the first time he read it. Closing his eyes in resignation, he pressed his head to the wall in his little castle of broken dreams and cold reality, fighting back the hopeless tears that choked his throat, knowing she wasn't just down the hall anymore, getting ready to come to him, the one that made her eyes spark in a way he hadn't seen since they first met. Swallowing thickly, pain reverberated through his body, his heart in a vise and head fogging as he recalled their first date. At first his feelings for her were purely driven by lust, being the most attractive woman he had ever laid eyes on, then that lust turned to some form of love that to this day Adam couldn't find the right words to explain.

Whenever Eve came into a room, she was always humming absently to herself. She always had an optimistic smile on her face and she was always talking about a brighter future for the both of them.

It took two years for Adam to realize that he had pasted on a feigned serene smile as they once more played their parts as the 'it' couple at the University while she spouted her pretty lies. This was not the life he had signed up for when he made the vows she so easily broke.

The Winchester's walked into another hole in the wall bar in another no name town outside of Sioux Falls. Dean immediately went over to chat up the bartender while Sam and Adam found a place to sit.

It's been a long haul. Eventually it wasn't all about Eve anymore. It was about Sam and Dean. Wasn't it enough that they walked two steps ahead while he'd fall three steps back? Adam wasn't a real Winchester, only by blood…he was almost there but not quite, and that made all the difference with Sam and Dean.

Eventually, Adam could tell Sam was watching him closely and he knew his facial expression had given away his true feelings. He hadn't grown up in Winchester fashion. He wasn't able to hide and mask any emotion like they easily could do as if flipping a switch, and they both were beginning to read him like an easy picture book.

"You ok?" Sam asked still watching him intently knowing he would be able to pick up on any lie or hesitation.

"What? Yeah," Adam blinked a few times to focus on what his half-brother was saying.

Sam knew instantly there was more to his story but he could see Adam was lost in his own mind for a minute and decided to try and distract him from wherever his thoughts had taken him, "So, Dean and I were talking and if you're going to be on the road with us we thought it would be a good idea for you to get a tattoo to ward off possession," he said quietly so no one would over hear. Despite the volume the music was set to in the bar Adam was surprised that he could even hear himself think in the first place.

"What?" he questioned absently thinking he was hearing things but Sam pulled his undershirt over to the side slightly to show what he was talking about, "Oh," was all Adam could reply as Dean made his way over to them with three glasses, a pitcher of beer and unsurprisingly the bartender's number on a napkin.

"Who died?" Dean smirked, trying to lighten the mood that Adam had regretfully caused to fall. He set a glass before each of them and filled it to the brim careful to not let the foam run over the edge.

"Is there any reason you don't want to get it?" Sam questioned seriously, his gaze following Dean momentarily.

Adam didn't reply. How could he explain to them about what it was like to be in love and have that love be pried away with brute force?

He and Eve had burned too hot, too bright, for too long; nothing that intense lasts long and now after that he was left with nothing but ashes.

Had he been too accommodating, changing himself to suit her petty needs, her whims, her dreams? Had he followed too blindly in his desperate need to cling to those fleeting moments of joy and sweetness that he had been deprived of growing up? Had he been the ultimate culprit in the demise of their love because he'd cave into her demands rather than speaking up when he felt at odds with something she thought they should be doing? When he lost sight of the man he once was - strong, efficient, determined to do the right thing no matter what, but willing to stand up for what he believed in even if it meant pushing her away for a brief time?

When had he lost touch with his wants and dreams? When had he started living for Eve and only Eve?

He'd grown quiet, listless, never speaking up if his convictions differed from the bright, happy dreams she'd spun of their life together, wanting to believe in the fantastical fantasies she'd shaped in her mind because he felt they were his due after the hell she'd put him through. Eve hadn't wanted to bust that all too fragile bubble they had drawn around themselves, and turned a blind eye to the fissures and cracks in that bubble in order to keep what was hears but not wanting it to crumble around and leave her empty-handed.

With Dean and Sam both watching him, waiting for an answer, he just stared at the head on his beer and remembered the night the world seemed to crash around him.

***Flashback***

"Come on, we've got to make our grand entrance at Tara's party," Eve told Adam as she put on the earrings he had given her earlier that month. They had been invited to yet another party, at one point Adam laughed to himself that they should start charging but being the 'it' couple on campus it was an unwritten law that they party wouldn't be good unless they were there. In all reality Adam wasn't much of a party person but when you have an angel on your arm, you just can't say no. Adam smiled watching in awe at how beautiful she was, with an almost glow about her as she slipped on her heels and they headed out the door.

They arrived at the party a half hour late, as Eve instructed, so they wouldn't be the first ones there. It was in full swing when they walked through the front door arm in arm, the music hitting their ears long before walking in, the smell of alcohol and recreational drugs soiled the air but Adam, as he always did, plastered on his smile. They made their rounds as a couple until Eve excused herself to talk to some sorority girls and Adam found himself absently listening to some jocks talk about the big game next week.

When his brain could no longer take the unintelligible conversation he wandered through the maze of people to find Eve. What he saw was her arms wrapped around someone's neck as they made out in a dimly lit corner.

***Present***

Adam didn't like thinking about that night, in fact he did everything in his power to erase it from his memory all together but he could never get the serpent tattoo on the guy's arm out of his mind. The same arm that was wrapped around Eve, his first and only love, as she threw his heart to the wind like it was some cheap accessory that she was done with.

"No reason," Adam sighed finally answering their questioning gazes and taking a long sip of beer, thinking silently to himself about solutions that he could have done to make Eve want him again.

"Dude," Dean waved his hand in front of his half-brother's face. "You look like a stiff on the peanut gallery. Stop running it to the ground, would ya?"

"What do you mean?" Adam pursed his lips, involuntarily placing his hand on his upper arm and tracing out a rough shape of a serpent.

"What he means," Sam interrupted, trying his hand at explaining with more lucidity. "Is that we've noticed that you've been upset. Is there anything we can do?"

"You guys know what it's like loving someone so much that you're willing to bend back so far for them that you don't care if you break?"

"Depends how far back," Dean chuckled but stopped short under Sam's stern glare.

Adam glanced between them with empty eyes which were fractured with morose discernment. "I'm being serious."

"We know, we know," Sam stepped on his older brother's foot for good measure and motioned for Adam to go on.

Hesitantly, he did. "There's always something to what people say. I just regret not listening because I believed in her so much that I stopped believing in myself."

"Is this about some chick?" Dean asked after a long swig, licking the foam from his upper lip.

Adam nodded in response, staring down at his hands which were resting on the table, quivering slightly. He tried his best to swallow all the diffidence that was on the surface but he didn't want their sympathy.

"She," He said slowly, a strangled smile playing at the corner of his mouth. "was the love of my life."

"What happened?" Sam inquired softly, not wanting to force such sensitive information out of his younger brother.

"She found someone else."

After the words had spilled out of his mouth, Adam sat upright. He thought if he had ever said those four words out loud something would finally be ripped out of his body for good…something he could never replace. Nothing in the world would be able to heal his limp, or the tightness in his hands when he struggled with clenching his fists.

But now, once it was all out in a short breath, Adam felt free.

No!

Adam didn't feel anything.

And that was better than freedom.