The day was only dawning. The first rays of sunlight pierced through the windows to gently light up the living room that was in complete disarray. Cardboard boxes were strewn here and there, some half opened, and some still sealed shut. Y/N sat on the rug in the middle of it all and rifled through one trying to find her toaster.

She had moved into this new house in this new small town over three months ago but she still hadn't unpacked properly. She did take out the bare necessities but she had been reluctant to make this house her home. It didn't feel right just yet. She wasn't ready to settle in and get comfortable.

She gave up on her hunt for the toaster after a couple of minutes, and with it her craving for freshly toasted bread for breakfast. She decided she'd have cereal like she always did and got up to get ready for work.

She had been going through her monotonous routine for what felt like forever, even though it has only been three months or less. As she stripped to shower, she looked down at the name tattooed on her just below her left breast. It was the same color as her skin and barely visible, bearing the name of her one true soul mate. All she had ever hoped was to find him, and make sense of this life in some way just like her parents had when they found each other.

It was an odd thing to have the name of your destined mate tattooed on you from the time of your birth but at least then you had a name – a way for you to know if this was it. At the same time, it was also a curse. Everyone else made it seem less than real. People don't always succeed in finding their soul mate as intended, and when they try to make it happen with other people, it just feels…empty. Y/N had seen some of her friends go through the very same thing.

Yet when you did find your one true mate, everything becomes magical. Everything just fits perfectly together. She'd seen it with her parents. They were perfect with each other, not because they were exactly the same but simply because even with their differences, they just fell into step with each other so effortlessly that it seemed like magic. When her mother died, the tattoo had completely disappeared off of her father's chest and with it, it seemed like true joy disappeared from his life as well. He says he's alright, that he's happy because he still has Y/N but she knew how empty he felt inside. Losing your soul mate was like losing the best and most vibrant part of yourself – without it, you're never truly yourself.

Perhaps that's why Y/N felt her life lacked meaning. She was missing that part of her too, but closing in on her 30s, she'd pretty much given up of ever finding him. Her search for him, googling his name had ended up being fruitless. All she ended up were images of guns.

Her tattoo itself was weird. She remembered how she'd panicked that one time when the name completely disappeared off her chest about five years ago. Y/N had known what it meant. She knew that her soul mate was dead because that's the only known reason why it would disappear like that. She'd mourned for his death like she'd known him her whole life, or perhaps even more. She'd felt so hopeless, like she'd lost the most precious thing before she could even truly find it.

Then four months later, it just reappeared without warning. She had no idea what was going on. Either her soul mate was dying and coming back to life, which was just stupid, or she had the weirdest tattoo in the world. This random disappearing and reappearing kept happening throughout the years, the longest being one and half years ago when it had disappeared for one whole year. And yet, it was back now. It has been for a few months.

She traced her fingertips over the name, and gently whispered a prayer like she did everyday. "Wherever you are, whatever you are doing, please stay safe. Don't disappear. Don't get killed. Just stay safe, Dean Winchester."

With a towel wrapped around his waist, Dean Winchester was in the middle of the strenuous task of achieving the perfect shave. Sometimes he wondered why he even made the effort when he very well knew that it would only grow up in less than half a day. When he nicked himself on the jaw, it aggravated him even more. He calmly put down the razor to wipe of the blood with a paper towel. He reached down to wipe another droplet that had dripped on to his chest.

His eyes lingered on the name tattooed there – Rachel Benson. He sighed to himself. He had stopped at nothing to search for her. He'd even used his fake FBI badge to get information on her only to find nothing. It was like she didn't even exist. Whoever this Rachel Benson was, she was like a ghost – hard to find, and with no proof of her existence on the face of this earth.

At least there was one solace. He knew she was still out there, even though he couldn't find her. He knew she was alive and well. That gave him some kind of hope knowing she simply existed. He'd seen it with his own eyes what losing your soul mate could do to you. He saw it happen first with his dad when their mother died, and then again with Sammy. The anguish that followed Sam even to this date since that fateful day in Palo Alto eight or so years ago still haunted him.

Dean sometimes wondered if he ever even wanted to find his soul mate at all. Doing what he did for a living, people around him kept dropping like flies. Everyone he ever got close to has ended up dead, even Sam at one point or the other. Maybe being unable to find her was actually a good thing. He couldn't imagine going through what his dad and Sam did. Just watching their pain had been traumatizing. The life he had, though it felt incomplete in some ways, it was still good. He can't lose it if he never even found it in the first place, right?

"I think I caught a case," Sam walked in, interrupting his train of thought.

Dean glanced at his brother. "Yeah?"

"A couple of deaths panned over the last three months, all in the same neighborhood a few towns over. The victims were found with their hearts missing."

Dean felt the adrenaline rush of excitement. This sounded good. He needed something good. "Let me guess. All in sync with the lunar cycle?"

"You bet," Sam grinned knowing how Dean felt about hunting real proper Werewolves.

"Well, Sammy," Dean said walking out and trying to ruffle his bed-head hair to some decorum of decency. "That's the best news I heard all week."