Regrets collect like old friends
Here to relive your darkest moments
I can see no way, I can see no way
And all of the ghouls come out to play
And every demon wants his pound of flesh
But I like to keep some things to myself
I like to keep my issues drawn
It's always darkest before the dawn
And I've been a fool and I've been blind
I can never leave the past behind
I can see no way, I can see no way
I'm always dragging that horse around
Our love is pastured, such a mournful sound
Tonight I'm gonna bury that horse in the ground
So I like to keep my issues drawn
But it's always darkest before the dawn
Shake it out, shake it out, shake it out, shake it out, ooh whoa
Shake it out, shake it out, shake it out, shake it out, ooh whoa
And it's hard to dance with a devil on your back
So shake him off, oh whoa
And I am done with my graceless heart
So tonight I'm gonna cut it out and then restart
'Cause I like to keep my issues drawn
It's always darkest before the dawn
Shake it out, shake it out, shake it out, shake it out, ooh whoa
Shake it out, shake it out, shake it out, shake it out, ooh whoa
And it's hard to dance with a devil on your back
So shake him off, oh whoa
And it's hard to dance with a devil on your back
And given half the chance would I take any of it back
It's a fine romance but it's left me so undone
It's always darkest before the dawn
Oh whoa, oh whoa...
Shake it out, shake it out, shake it out, shake it out, ooh whoa
Shake it out, shake it out, shake it out, shake it out, ooh whoa
And it's hard to dance with a devil on your back
So shake him off, oh whoa
It's 6:30 in the morning when the characteristic throttling of the Impala sounds in front of Jo's apartment in Duluth.
She presses her knuckles against clenched eyelids and frees a slow, unsteady breath. She's found no sleep last night and is barely holding it together.
The last thing she needs right now is another encounter with the Winchesters.
No thanks. She really doesn't need them or their bad conscience to rub her inexperience in her face.
She'd rather push last night back into the deep dark corners of her mind, where she stores the boxes of memories that involve her stupidity and the Winchesters.
Amateurs can't do the job. The words ring bitter in her mind. Until last night she thought she'd passed amateur status.
Apparently she had not - as it had become painfully clear to her.
A car door opens and slams shut. Only one, she notes.
She listens to feet slurring over the coarse gravel the marks the way to her front door.
A second later there's a knock on her door.
"Jo. Open up," Dean calls for her. "Jo. Joo-o. Harvelle."
What the heck?
She frowns and gets up to take a look through her peephole. She reaches for her knife and bottle of holy water and braces herself. It's not like she didn't learn a lesson last night. A few actually.
"And I didn't even expect a call", she comments dryly as she opens up, A Pause. „What do you want, Dean?"
No answer. Just a drunken shrug. Asshole. Jo rolls her eyes. „You look like shit, go sober up," she snarks and slams the door back shut.
She plops onto her couch and crosses her arms over her face. Damn you, Dean Winchester.
She's been holding it together so well.
In fact, she's been doing surprisingly fine considering that she's been mistreated, mishandled, mistreated and badly tipped tonight.
Hot tears escape her eyes and she allows herself a convulsive sob, just one.
With a huff of anger she pulls herself back together and furiously wipes her tears away.
Asshole. Dickassheaded fuckingshitfaced Dean Winchester.
Come drunk-knocking on her door after his "This is my fight"-shit? Seriously?
She peeks outside her window and catches a glimpse of the impala. It's parked uncharacteristically askew in her driveway.
No Sam. Damn it.
Suddenly Jo finds it dreadfully quiet.
The cold feeling of dread spreads within her chest as she makes it back to the front door.
She finds Dean's slumped down on her pathway, his head resting on one bended knee.
His right hand half-heartedly grasps his injured shoulder while the other one loosely holds a bottle of Jack Daniels.
It's as good as empty.
She quickly tests him with holy water, but other then a grunt he shows no reaction.
"Come on" Jo mutters and hoists him up to drag his sorry sight inside.
His limb weight pulls painfully on her strained body and she has to unceremoniously grab him beneath his armpits to somehow manoeuver him through the door.
He doesn't protest, which further unsettles her.
She hauls him onto her couch and reaches inside his leather jacket for his cellphone. Her fingers jitter over the buttons as she dials Sam.
One ring and he picks up.
"Dean, where are you?"
Jo breathes out.
Thank god, he's alive.
"Sam."
"Jo?" He echoes and Jo knows in an instant that he's himself again. Unmistakably. No demon taken by surprise could fake this much emotion into the one syllable of her name. Relieve floods her body as she slumps onto the armrest of her couch.
"Yeah, it's me."
"God, Jo, listen, you shouldn't be the one making this call."
Jo pinches the bridge of her nose and presses her eyelids together to the point it hurts.
"Sam, save it. It's OK."
"No it isn't." Sam instantly protests. Jo sighs. She's just to fucking tired for that discussion right now.
"True, but it's not your fault," she offers lamely.
„It's not yours either."
It wasn't - was it? It'd been plaguing her all night. She'd been trusting and dumb. Careless. Amateur... Stupid school-girl.
„Jo, listen..." No. No more listening tonight.
„Where are you?"
Sam inhales sharply at her cutoff, but relents.
"At Bobby's." She registers the information.
"Did you kill it?"
"It escaped."
"Shit."
"Yeah."
Pause.
"Jo…" He tries again and she wonders how often she'll have to shut him down again.
"Dean's here. He's drunk like shit, I literally had do drag him onto my couch.
A few hours ago he was pretty clear that he wanted me to stay away from you guys and now he's drooling on my cushions.
Obviously it's not your death by demon that drove him to my door, so what's this about?"
"It's Dean. He doesn't always apply to logic," Sam offers awkwardly.
"I'll come and get him. I'll just take one of Bobby's old heaps. I guess I can make it in 5 hours."
He sighs and Jo notices how worn he sounds.
She absentmindedly nods into the speaker, looking down onto Dean's sleeping form.
He looks as tired as Sam sounds. Not from the day or the permille, but generally plain tired.
He's lying on his stomach, flat on his bad shoulder. A pained frown is showing on his face.
She carefully props a pillow under his shoulder.
He's out like a light, doesn't even react when she turns his body upwards to fit the cushion beneath his torso.
When she pulls away however, Dean catches her index finger with the hand he's tugged under his face.
She looks down at their hands for a moment, his index finger hooked around hers.
Something inside her stirs and she hesitates for a second.
"You know what, no."
"What do you mean, no?"
"I mean, no, you're not going to drive for 5 hours through the night to get him. That's ridiculous. Take a break, sleep."
"You sure?"
"Positive. I doubt he'll be up before noon anyway."
"When he is he'll be moody and a dick," Sam demurs but Jo just snorts.
"I can handle him. I'm a bartender," she states matter-of-factly.
"And a Harvelle." Sam adds and the plain, forthright way he says it re-pieces a bit of her shattered pride.
At least one Winchester thinks that she can take care of herself.
But at the same time his small compliment leaves a bad taste as images of kind, safe Sam clawing her wrist creep into her mind.
I could be more to you, Jo.
She shudders.
"Jo." Suddenly his voice makes her flesh crawl. Sam. Not Demon-Sam, she tells herself and wonders how often she'll have to remind herself again in the future.
„About yesterday..."
"No, Sam. Don't...Really, don't." She tries, but senses that he won't give up anyway. It's what's so fundamentally different about him and his brother. Dean bottles it up, Sam needs to get it out.
"Let me apologize, Jo. Please. Just let me say that I'm sorry." His voice cracks and she relents, though she dreads his apology somehow... Dreads letting him come close again in any form.
She exhales sharply.
"Fine."
"I'm really sorry." He says, just like that, and his voice feels like a hug. Her eyes start to well up and she quickly clears her throat. No more crying. No more weakness. A hunter, not some kid.
"I know." Her words come out raspy.
"Man... a break really would be nice, huh?"
Sam awkwardly tries to joke and Jo knows that they're going to be all right sometime, her and Sam.
"Yeah, I'm really craving a boring weekend in front of my tv..." she says, her words coming out surprisingly warm.
She can hear the breath Sam let's out. Enough now, she decides.
„Good night, Sam." She presses the button.
Pain. That's what greets Dean Winchester as he wakes up the next morning.
Throbbing pain in his head, searing pain in his shoulder, dull pain in his joints.
He groans and laboriously hoists himself up into a sitting position, cursing at the pins and needles in his arm.
He lets his head fall back. What the fuck?
A lock joggles and he turns his head to see Jo walk through what appears to be the front door.
"You're up. That's unexpected," she comments upon seeing him awake and pulls a small, round container out of a plastic bag she's carrying.
Before he can orientate himself she's tossing it to him. He catches it out of reflex. Pain killers. Thank god.
"Thanks," he mutters, his voice hoarse and croaky. He pops in some pills and Jo hands him a glass of water.
Holy water, she doesn't serve anything else anymore. He nods appreciatively and chugs it all down in one go.
Jo watches him with her hands on her hips.
„I took your beloved baby for a ride."
His head snaps up.
„You what?"
She dangles his keys in front of his face with relish.
„Give them back."
„When you're sober," she tells him in a tone she's unmistakably inherited from Ellen.
"I've got to get back to Sam." Dean instantly protests and moves to get up, but Jo pushes him back down with little effort.
"Sam's fine, I called him after I dragged your wasted ass in here this morning." Dean's mouth forms an O and he looks down, avoiding her gaze.
Jo turns around and makes it to the small kitchen unit at the other side of her one room apartment. Glancing over her shoulder she catches Dean's sour expression.
"Oh come on Dean, it was 5 miles to the drug store and back," she comments dryly while opening the fridge to take out some milk. „I didn't harm your baby."
"Bitch." Dean mutters under his breath and Jo's head snaps around.
She slams the can of milk down on the counter, her eyes narrowing to slits, cutting him off before he can say another word.
When she speaks her voice is silent and steady, sharp like a knife.
"Don't you fucking swear at me, Winchester. I've barely slept. I'm tired, I'm hungry and I swear to you I'll bitch-curse the keys of your poor poor Baby if you so much as look at me the wrong way. So get over it, get your ass over here and sit down for lunch. Are we clear?"
Dean snorts snidely, but then nods and gets up before he risks driving her further up the wall. Angry Harvelle women are nasty creatures.
He plops down on one of the folding chairs next to the small kitchen table and winces when Jo slams down two plates and forks in front of him.
She pulls another container out of the plastic bag she'd carried in earlier.
"There, pie, jackass." She snaps and unceremoniously drops the container in front of him.
He instantly feels like the biggest dick on earth.
"You got me pain killers and pie." He states meekly and Jo shrugs.
"I didn't expect you to appreciate it, so don't sweat yourself," she says without looking at him and Dean sighs.
"I'm a dick." Jo rolls her eyes, but relaxes. She knows it's as close to an apology as it'll get, so she'll take it.
"Eat," she orders and sits down opposite him.
"Let me," Dean says, when Jo gets up to do the dishes.
He pushes himself up to a standing position and reaches for their plates and mugs.
Jo smiles at the gesture.
She watches him as he places the dishes in the sink, his movements slow and heavy-going.
A mug glides out of his hand and clatters against the steel. "Damn it," he curses under his breath, frustrated by the missing muscular control over his injured arm.
"It's fine," Jo tells him as she comes to stand beside him. "No, it's not." Dean mutters and drops the sponge into the sink. He braces his arms against the counter and drops his chin to his chest.
"Nothing's fine." He mutters through clenched teeth and kicks the counter in frustration. It's been a fucking vortex of not fine lately.
The weight of Jo's hand on his arm pulls him out of his thoughts. Her touch is unexpected, yet gentle and consolatory. His chest tightens.
When he turns to look at her she's watching him carefully.
"Go get some more sleep." She tells him calmly and he's thankful that she won't ask what exactly he was referring to. He's not entirely sure himself.
He runs his hand down his face and gives her a short nod. "Yeah, sleep would probably be good."
"Take the bed. It's more comfortable."
He eyes her warily. He's absolutely clueless to why she's so nice to him. He surely doesn't deserve it.
She rolls her eyes at his hesitation, "Don't be shy, Dean-O."
Dean manages a tired yet genuine half-smile.
"Thanks." He mutters and pushes himself off the counter.
He sits down on the edge of the mattress and gazes at his feet, examining a hole in the grey wool of his right sock, right above the tip of his big toe.
He can't remember pulling his boots off.
He can't remember getting here.
He can't even remember getting into the impala.
He lets his torso fall back into the cushions and stares at the ceiling.
The only thing he can recall is a lingering sense of deprivation and a lot of Jack.
Jo's voice pulls him out of his thoughts. He turns his head into her direction. "Huh?"
She's pointing a finger at his trousers.
"Don't you want to take off your jeans?"
Dean runs his palms over his face, brushing at the stubble growing along his jaw.
"My pants…yeah." He answers absentmindedly, his voice weary and hollow. He pulls off his jeans and crawls under the covers, without any further remark. Jo watches him with a frown as he drifts off to sleep in an instant.
She'd expected a raunchy comeback or at least a smirk at her request.
It unsettles her to see him so completely depleted. She knows very well that no one is unshakable.
She'd learned the hard way the day her Dad didn't make it home.
But she can hardly imagine that last night's events alone would unsaddle one Dean Winchester.
The burbling sound of the shower seeps into his consciousness as he slowly wakes up.
It's dawn and his eyes are met with the sharp contrast of the digital numbers of Jo's alarm clock flaring bright red from the nightstand.
It's 7 p.m.
The bathroom door opens and the fresh scent of shower gel emerges.
Dean notices that it's the same one that lingers on the pillow beneath his head, agreeably mixed with Jo's individual scent.
He watches her as she steps out. Her feet are bare; jeans and a simple khaki shirt nicely hug her lean form.
She's kneading her damp hair with a white towel, her head bent to the side in the process.
Her lips are slightly parted and her cheeks rosy in contrast the otherwise creamy skin.
His eyes trace her cheekbone, down to the angle of her jaw, to crook of her slender neck.
Here her delicate, creamy skin abruptly fades to ugly yellow, stained with the angry, revolting marks of his own brother's hands.
His face convulses with shame.
Jo notices his expression.
"What's wrong" She places the towel onto the backrest of a chair.
"Nothing," Dean replies without looking at her.
Jo rolls her eyes. Sure. Everything peachy. "Obviously."
She catches him as he once again involuntarily glances at her bruises and before resolutely casting his eyes down.
She walks over to her bed and crouches down in front of him.
"Dean?"
She wants to know what's in his head, why he's here now when he left her yesterday after she'd been beaten and choked by his own brother.
"Dean, look at me."
He doesn't.
Frustrated she stands up, grabs her jacket and boots and makes it for the door.
"Where are you going?" Dean asks and Jo huffs at his tone of voice.
It instantly tears at a nerve that wore dangerously thin over the years of explaining her every action to her overprotective mother.
"For a walk."
"Alone?" Jo rolls her eyes.
"Yes, alone."
"It's late. And dark." Seriously, Dean? She raises an eyebrow at him.
"Are you telling me you're afraid of the dark?" she derides dryly.
Dean stays mum.
"Thought so," she hisses through clenched teeth. "Then I don't see a problem with leaving you alone. You?" She gives him a challenging look.
"No, 'course not," Dean backpedals. Idiot. He very well knows that she labels his protectiveness as chauvinistic crap.
He also knows that he's in no position to doubt her ability to take care of herself,
being the one who left her behind without a question after she'd been tied up to that pole.
So why was he asking now? Even if it had just been instinct - it was ridiculous and condescending.
He knows it, she knows it. He can see the same thought mirroring in her tightly set jaw and her fierce eyes.
She's halfway out the door when he calls after her, anyway.
"Mind if I come along?"
A conciliation offer. She cocks her head in consideration for a moment before she accepts with a silent nod.
The stones clatter beneath their boots as they're dragging themselves along the rocky shore in bland silence.
About ten minutes from her apartment Jo sits down on one of the bigger rocks. She's exhausted and her head hurts like a bitch.
Maybe it's from the lack of sleep, maybe she's incurred a concussion - she definitely needs to recharge.
She watches the reflections of the stars dancing over water. She's never been one looking patterns in the night sky.
She'd just gaze until everything fades and a peaceful feeling sets in her gut.
Closing her eyes she inhales deeply and savors the cool, clean air roaming her nostrils.
For the first time in the past 24 hours she's able to really take a breath. Exhaustion washes over her like a wave and her body shudders with a yawn.
Dean sits down beside her.
She nudges him with her shoulder.
"Why are you here?" she asks and her voice carries no accusation.
She's too damn tired for another fight.
Dean winces. He knew he would have to answer that question to her some time.
He has to answer himself, too. But so far he refuses to even ask himself.
He picks up a stone, probes its weight on each of his fingers and feels its cool, slick surface.
He flips it into the water and watches it skip. Once, twice, gone. He shrugs.
Jo sighs, "Fine. Next question - why didn't you let me come with you?"
This time he answers without hesitation.
"Because it's better for you," he tells her like he's told himself over and over again since he walked out that bar.
He picks up another pebble.
Jo shakes her head and steels it from his hand.
"Yeah, I wonder a lot about that one. Tell me, how's it better?" she demands, slinging the stone close to the water surface.
Once, twice, thrice. It crashes into a wave.
"How was being left alone after being abused by a demon wearing your brother better for me then coming along to find and end that son of a bitch?"
Dean bites his tongue.
"I don't know, " he mutters quietly.
Jo sighs, "Is it because it's 'your fight' or is it because it still is not for me to fight?
Because I'm still just 'a kid chasing after some romantic notions'?"
Dean shakes his head.
"It's not about that." He affirms dejectedly.
"No?"
"No, it's not about you hunting."
Jo huffs.
"Then tell me - what is it about?" She aks, tossing another stone.
Thud. It disappears immediately. Another toss, another thud.
Frustrated she grabs the material of her pants above her knees, her fingernails digging into her thighs.
"You constantly swing in and out of my life - it's like that freaking Katy Perry song."
"That's the problem, Jo," Dean says, shuffling his feet in the shingle.
„I honestly don't know whether I should put as much distance between you and me or don't let you out of my sight.
Either way hasn't worked exactly well so far. Even if I do stay away some demon comes to take you for bait," he explains and Jo snorts.
„I'm none of your responsibilities, Dean. "
„I know. "
„You do? Then why did you come here? "
Yeah, well...He' s still not sure about that.
She watches him for a moment before she pulls out his keys of her pocket and wordlessly slips them into his.
Dean closes his palm around the familiar metal. He nods to himself. Message received.
"I'll be gone as soon as we're back," he tells her, his voice raw.
Jo shakes her head, "I wasn't prompting you to leave."
He looks at her for the first time since they left her apartment.
"Why the keys then? "
Jo sighs.
"Cause I'm no longer forcing you to stay either."
She takes a moment to consider her words.
"Look, I chose to become a hunter by myself and I know the risks.
You somehow willingly seem to ignore that.
I will face demons. Whether or why they're after me – it doesn't matter - I'll be after them.
That thing talked about my dad, how he died. So don't tell me it's your fight, since you have no right to claim it.
I still don't get why you're here now, but I'm not Sam. I'm not some little sibling you have to look out for.
So do me a favor and quit trying to figure out what's best for me and decide what you want from me for a change, everything else apart."
Decide what you want. Dean huffs quietly.
"I don't think I've ever been asked what I want in the past 20 years," he says and wonders why he's said that out loud.
Jo is quiet for a moment, caught a little off-guard by his admittance.
„Let's get back. I want to look at you shoulder. You need fresh bandages," she tells him finally and tugs at the sleeve of his leather jacket.
"But first you've got to shower. You smell like a hunter who hasn't left his table at the roadhouse for a week."
„Nice work for a butcher, huh? "Jo jokes proudly as she examines Deans wound. It looks good so far.
Pleased with her own work, she secures the bandages with practiced movements.
Her mood shifts when she catches Dean watching her with an unreadable expression.
„What? "She asks irritated by his intense gaze.
She moves to pack away the dressing material, but halts when he reaches for her hair.
He gently pushes it back to examine her neck, the touch of his fingertips feather light against her skin. She shivers.
His hand carefully travels over her bruises, then further north to the bump the collision with the wooden bar counter left on her forehead,
examining the wounds that mirror his worst nightmare - his baby brother turning bad.
Jo watches him intently as he stares at her forehead and at the same time somewhere else entirely.
She reaches for his hand and curls her fingers around his to stop his movements.
Squeezing his palm she directs his eyes to hers, „Dean? "
He swallows, carefully avoiding her gaze before he speaks.
"My father told me to kill Sam if I can't save him from the dark side," he croaks and Jo's whole body goes quiet.
She releases his hand, only to take it back into hers.
Her pulse rings in her ears as she stands before him, numb.
There's nothing one can say to that.
So she just stands there, looking at him wide eyed and holding his hand.
And suddenly he's looking back at her, giving her a small, helpless shrug.
And it's then, after a breath, when she still does not look away, that his defenses break - and he tells her everything.
He tells her about the demon chase that began with his mother's death.
My dad started me in this when I was so young.
About his dad's obsession.
No one in their right mind chooses this life.
About Sam running away for college... and Jess.
I wish I could do something else.
About Sam's visions and the other psychic children, about Sam going MIA.
About his father selling his soul for his life. And finally, how everything led back to John Winchester's last order.
Safe Sam, or kill Sam.
"I can't kill my little brother", he concludes meekly. Broken.
Jo feels numb.
Now she knows. Knows, what's his fight.
And the knowledge detaches him the Dean before her from the Dean she saw merely a moment ago.
Gone is this guy she somehow constantly feels the need to prove herself to.
Gone the badass, the invincible hunter.
Gone the son of her father's doom.
Before her, right now, he's just a boy that's constantly carrying too much weight for anyone's shoulders.
Spending a lifetime looking out for others, never asking for anything himself.
And she respects him more than ever.
She's still standing close to him, as he leans against the kitchen counter.
For a long second the buzzing of the refrigerator is the only sound in her apartment. She takes a breath.
"You won't." She tells him firmly, though her hands are shaking.
„You won't." She repeats and slides her arms over his shoulders and pulls him into a tight hold. „You won't."
For a long time Dean doesn't react at all, but then he brings his arms around her back and hugs her tight.
And somewhere deep inside him, tentatively, he senses why he came back in the first place.
Because for him Jo might just be one of those good things you don't throw away.
Something, that might be hard to find later.
„Wanna stay and get some rest?" she asks against his shoulder. He nods, mouthing a quiet 'Thank you' into her hair.
„Then come," Jo whispers, taking him by the hand. She leads him over to her bed and lifts the edge covers for him.
„Get in, I'll just go change and brush my teeth."
Lying on his back, lights out he feels the mattress shift under her weight when she too slips under the covers.
Time passes as he ponders whether and how to bridge the 20 centimeters of space between them.
She moves beside him.
"It's been a pretty fucked up weekend so far," she whispers and now that she's turned onto her back he can feel the warmth spreading from her body, their arms nearly touching, and the backs of their hands only inches apart.
"Yeah, it has."
He admits and turns his arm so that her fingers come to rest in his palm. He squeezes her hand with his thumb.
"I'm sorry, Jo."
Her fingertips dance tentatively against his palm, unsure how close to him she dares to let herself get.
But being honest to herself, she knows that it's long too late for that decision anyway.
So she takes his hand firmly into hers and shuffles closer to rest her head against his shoulder.
„Good night, Dean. "
„'Night Jo. "