There was a picture of himself and his wife on their wedding day, arms wrapped around each other and pure happiness on the faces. There were also pictures of his two daughters. Mary, the eldest at twenty seven, posed with her husband and their son with a fuzzy teddy bear and a cute wal-mart backdrop. Elizabeth, now twenty five, had just graduated from law school and sat for her picture dressed in her cap and gown. On the fireplace mantle sat more pictures of family events; silly pictures taken of his grandson, his son-in-law struggling to carry a particularly heavy box into his new home, his daughters sitting on Santa's knee at the mall many years ago, his infant daughters in the bathtub, and many other embarrassing pictures of his loved ones. When friends came over this Winchester was never afraid to show off the memories caught on film, although it embarrassed others.
This era in his life was enjoyable and full of happy times with the people he loved, but it wasn't always like this for most of his fifty seven years. His family now knew little of his past; of his childhood. He refused to talk extensively about it, even to his wife. It was his biggest flaw: not being able to open up to his wife and children, but he felt some kind of duty to put his past behind him and start a new, safe, life in which the people he cared about most did not need to share in his pain. For that is what he felt because of his past, pain. There were some happy times that he did not regret, and some proud moments too, proud of himself and proud of his brother.
His brother was the one thing that kept him going when he was younger, and he strongly guessed that he was one of the things that kept his brother going. They supported each other physically and mentally, which was a good thing or they would have fallen apart years ago. But the majority of that time in his life had been filled with sadness and stress. There was no chance for a normal life, it was all work and no play, although some of the things he got to do as part of his training were fun.
During that time in his life he learned more about himself than he had ever thought possible. He learned how far he would go for other people, and how far they would go for him. Although he refused to talk about his brother, his mother, and his father it did not mean that he had forgotten about them. Quite the contrary, he never stopped thinking about them, even after all these years. He had built a new life, a new family, and new future, but he was always haunted by his past. The misfortune and the sacrifices that they had had to make. The one thing, other than memories, that he had left from his past was something he himself put together; a photo album.
The photo album was his most prized possession, only he knew that it existed, and it was the one thing he would put before his family, although it shamed him to admit it even to himself. The photo album was like any old keepsake; the pages were krinkled at the ends from turning the pages, and the pages had faded from white to a dull yellow. The writing beneath the photographs were faded and had been written over several times. There was only one day of the year that he allowed himself to give in and flip open the old album.
On the anniversary of the night his whole world fell apart for the first time, as he did tonight, he bought himself a twelve pack, turned on the reading lamp in the dead of the night, and flipped through his memories. Pictures of the Winchester brothers covered almost every page but the first page was reserved for his mother. He had not gotten to know her well in the limited time they had shared together but she still held a special place in his heart. The first pages after that held pictures of a young John Winchester and two young boys, one barely out of diapers and the other usually wearing a superman cape. All three of them had huge smiles on their faces, but John's was forced, there was obviously a lot going on in his mind when a lot of his pictures were taken. He recognized the depression in his father's smile but at the time of the picture he was sure that he had not noticed the state of his father at all. As he moved along in the photo album he came across pictures of himself and his brother later in life, when they were left alone to look after themselves for weeks at a time when their father went hunting for the thing that had killed their mother. He soon came across pictures of himself and a special girl of his past. They had not worked out, for reasons he hated to think about.
He kept turning the pages to the next phase of his life; his brother. They had made an awesome team when it came to hunting demons, although both of them, at times, had felt that it was all for nothing, but they stayed true to themselves and could help but save people from what they thought didn't exist. They continued their stressful "job" even after they had destroyed the demon that had killed their mother and destroyed their futures. Next came the page for his father, who sacrificed himself for his son. At the very end of the album there were pages for his brother, each page held pictures of the same face, whether it was smiling, frowning, or down right angry it was his favorite face.
His brother had meant so much to him and he, like his father, had made a sacrifice to save his family. They had tried, they tried to find a loophole but it was impossible, his brother had pulled the short straw and there was nothing they could do about. Tears started rolling down his face as he stared at the pictures of his brother. He couldn't save him. He had been saved by his brother countless times, but he could not return the favor and he was ashamed. He knew his brother did not blame him, they had both tried to find a solution but in the end his brother was happy that he could save him one last time. Tears were now streaming onto his chest as he remembered his brother's last words written on the page in front of him.
"You start a new life, the one you always wanted. I dragged you into this and look where it got you; us. This is my penance, my payment for ruining your life as soon as you had finally built it up again. I hope you have a good life, don't worry about me, I accept this. I love you."
He let out a small sob.
"Honey?" asked a small, tired voice from the hallway. His wife appeared around the corner with a worried look on her face. "What are you doing up at this hour?"
He didn't answer, he just stared at his photo album. She approached him and looked at the picture of Dean's smiling face and the quote written beneath it. She did not understand everything that had happened to her husband but she finally understood why her husband was so hurt by his past. She took his hand with tears in her eyes.
"Come to bed, Sam." she said.
"It's Sammy."