Dean had always had his ticker. And so did Sam. And Dad too. Everyone had them. Dad's had red zeroes, always. Sam's got lower over the years, until the day he left to go to college, and it read 12 hours. From then on, when Dean saw him, Sam's had red zeroes too. But Dean's always had dashes. He was the only one. The guys in school always had gray numbers on them. They told him his dashes meant that he was never gonna have someone who would love him. He told them to fuck off. Dean acted like he didn't care, like he couldn't give two shits. Truth was, he checked it every morning. And every night. And every time he walked into a bar. But nope, always dashes. Always the damn dashes. And then he started to think that...well, maybe that those guys were right. He wasn't ever gonna find anyone. So he dedicated himself to loving Sammy. Taking care of him, watching out for him. Sam was always asking Dean what the ticker said, all worried, because he's Sam and that's what Winchesters do. Dean just pulled his sleeve down and proceeded to change the subject. Because it was still those damn dashes. The day that Sammy was stabbed, it was still dashes. When Dean went to that crossroads, it was still dashes. It was dashes for a whole year. After that, Dean didn't know, because apparently when your soul is condemned to the down below, you get your ticker ripped off. And after 40 years, Dean pretty much forgot about those stupid dashes. Until the day he popped up out of the ground. That day, September 18, 2008, it read six days. Dean knew that hell had screwed with it. He had dashes, not numbers. Never numbers. He didn't have a soul mate. Nope. Absolutely impossible. But it kept counting down. Dean kept looking at his ticker, all the time, every minute because it was absolutely unbelievable. When the wind started blowing through the barn it read two minutes. When it got to thirty seconds, Dean stared. He stared at that thing until it was a small gray five. And then he looked up. He saw blue eyes and heard "I'm the one who gripped you tight and raised you from perdition." He forgot about the ticker for a while. Until this "Castiel" person was gone. When he remembered, Dean finally looked down at his wrist.
He got gray zeroes in return.