Since They Have Been Gone

by That Girl Six

John Winchester wasn't the only soldier they lost that week. Sometimes doing your duty and being a good son really sucks.

Disclaimer: I don't own my education and will not for many years. Therefore, I certainly cannot afford to own a copyright. Maybe someday Kripke will sell it to me at a greatly reduced rate. Until then, this is just for fun, folks/ Rated R for language and nothing more. I've been married to the military for far too long not to have a mouth. / This story is Gen, as always, because I don't know how to write anything else. / Lyrics from Neil Young's Old Man / Spoilers through 2.06 No Exit.

Note: The writing in this story is a little more experimental for me than usual. Hopefully it worked out. / Thanks for reading!

This story is set between "No Exit" and "The Usual Suspects".

---

Since They've Been Gone
by That Girl Six

Love lost, such a cost,
Give me things that don't get lost.

Dean stared after Jo as she stalked off, wanting so badly to go after her. 'Friends don't let friends sulk alone', Sam had told him once while dragging him out of a bar. He'd thought it stupid at the time, but, by God, if the kid wasn't right this time. He tried to ignore how much it stunned him to have her look at him so hatefully and concentrate on her instead. He could figure out what exactly Ellen had told her later. That look on Jo's face was what mattered right now. If anyone would understand how wounds like the ones left behind by losing a parent could turn on you out of nowhere, it was him. Losing a parent isn't something you just get over, not by a long shot, no Siree. He didn't have a clue what it was that he wanted to do for her at the moment, but he knew he had to do something to erase that look from her eyes. Maybe it was a little selfish on his part (he had to know why), but he still wanted to at least try. He wasn't a guy who had many friends. He didn't stay in one place long enough. So when he did have friends, he didn't know what to do when they walked out on him. He couldn't let her just walk out on him, not like that. But that look . . .

Over his shoulder, Sam was softly calling him. "Dean? We should probably go."

"We can't, not yet."

"I think the message was pretty clear."

"Well then, it's a good thing I have that selective hearing thing Dad always accused you of having, huh?"

Fine. If he couldn't get through to Jo, if she wanted to be that way—he couldn't even see her down the way now anyway—he would at least let Ellen have a piece of his mind. Walking with a purpose, Dean turned on his heel and made his way back toward the front door of the rickety old roadhouse. He selectively ignored his brother's call to come back knowing the kid wasn't going anywhere anyway. He had the keys. The door creaked on him as he pushed it open and carefully looked for the barrel of a shotgun as he crossed the threshold. He wasn't entirely surprised when he didn't find one. The back turned to him was more what he expected. It was what he wanted.

Huskily he croaked, "Ellen?"

The answer was pretty much what he'd expected as well. The beer bottle that narrowly missed his head didn't even make him flinch. He simply stared back at the woman, watching her pant in tearful frustration and wishing like hell that he could stop feeling like he had somehow caused those tears, and waited. When she didn't say anything and only looked at him with eyes that would have probably otherwise killed him, he took one step back and held his hands up in surrender.

Deciding that gentle apparently wasn't the way to go (he should have known better anyway), he straightened and put a little more force into his voice. He started his piece, fully intending to get it out quickly and be done with it. "We're not staying. I'm not that stupid. I just wanted to say—Look, I don't know what happened with my dad. I wasn't lying when I said that we had never heard of you. So whatever my father was to you and yours, I can't fix that for you. I'd like to know what happened some day when you're of the mind to tell me, but that's not . . . Lately I'm coming to the realization that I really don't know as much about my dad as I thought I did. I've spent my whole life with only one rule to get me through: what would Dad do if it were him instead of me? But now I don't know what that means anymore."

To her credit, Ellen didn't throw anything else at him, which was about as good a sign as he was going to get. She had turned her back to him once again, but she didn't walk away either. Her shoulders heaved even though he couldn't hear her crying. He knew the tears had to be there. Of course they were. He was probably making them worse, too, but he wasn't done. But maybe when he was she would at least be able to look at him again.

Dean's voice became more demanding of her attention as he tried to do for her what he wished like hell someone had been able to do for his family so long ago now. It probably would have fallen on deaf ears then, but Ellen was sensible and not a godforsaken stubborn Winchester. This would pass and she'd listen. Or she'd regret it later on. Measuring his words to keep them kind instead of ordering, he said, "I'm not entirely clueless, though. I knew a lot more about the guy than most anybody else in the world. And right now, I can see him and Sam standing right here in this room the way you and Jo were just awhile ago. I know what Dad would do in this situation because I saw him do it. I know I'm probably the last person in the world you want advice from, but you're going to get it anyway. I'm going to tell you the same thing that I bet he would want you to know right now—don't. That's it. Don't, because you can't take any of it back. Don't blame yourself. Don't blame Jo. Get angry and get hurt and then let it go. Don't let it fester the way he did. Right now, my brother is sitting out in that car most likely thinking about the same thing I am. He stopped thinking about you and Jo fighting as soon as she walked away and has moved on to guilting himself to death out there. He's thinking about all of the things he said the night he walked out on us like she did you. He's thinking about all of the things Dad said that night. And right now he's trying to figure out how any of that was important enough that they gave up four damned years of each other's lives—the last four years. Sam can't get those back any more than my father can. So don't. Don't let that happen to you two the way it happened to them. Just don't."

Still there was nothing but silence to greet him, so he took one more step away from the first friend he'd had in a really, really long time. "I'll get out of your hair. I—I'm sorry we didn't know about you sooner. It would have been nice to know you more than for a couple of weeks. I hope you guys end up okay. I really do."

The door creaked so loud that Dean didn't hear Ellen whispering his name. He didn't hear her again when his boots clomped on the wooden step in front of the door, the echo blocking her voice out. He almost didn't hear her even when his feet dragged through the gravel of the parking area until he heard her hand bang on the doorjamb to get his attention. His hand stayed frozen on the roof of the car as he turned just his head back in her direction, waiting.

"Give me time to cool off," the woman said softly. With a pointed look at the shadow already trying to be as invisible as possible in the cabin of the car, she said, "You boys stick together and be careful."

Even though his mind screamed that it was a bad, bad idea to push any harder, Dean took that as a sign that she still cared at least a little bit about his brother and asked her evenly, "It's probably early to ask, but I need to know: are we still safe here? Is my brother safe here?"

Their eyes met for a moment, and Ellen knew exactly what it was that Dean was asking. He knew that things between them weren't going to be right for a long time, but he still needed someplace that was going to be safe for his kid brother. Above all else, he needed to know that Sam would still have a place to go if things went to pot. By way of answering, Ellen requested, "You'll call me when you get to where you're going? So I know you both got there okay?"

Dean bit the inside of his cheek to keep the triumphant, sweet smile from invading his face. He tapped the roof of his baby twice, ready to load up. With a nod at her, he gave her an opening and said, "I'll let the phone ring twice and hang up so you'll know it's us and that we're okay. You have my number if you want to do anything about it."

"Do you know where you're going?"

"Got something to take care of. I've been putting it off, but this seems like as good a time as any." He put all the heart he had to give to someone who wasn't his brother into his voice and said, "We'll be seeing you."

Ellen nodded but didn't say anything back. She watched the Impala as it spun gravel and fishtailed from trying to pull out too hard too fast. When the Winchester boys were nothing more than taillights, she finally let herself go back inside to her suddenly very cold, very lonely home. That belt of José was going to feel damned good at the back of her throat, no doubt.

---

Later that night once he'd settled them both in a fairly nice room for their standards, Dean sat heavily on the bed. He stared at the hotel phone trying to decide if he really wanted to call Ellen or not. He knew he'd promised, and it would probably go a long way to smooth things over with her about lying to her a few days before, but he didn't know. He had the twitchy feeling that if he did call, she would definitely call back and want to talk things out some more. Chicks did that, no matter how old they were. Even Ellen couldn't fight biology. He could call her on the hotel phone, leaving the call to be charged to the card later on, which would leave her with no real way of calling him back if he turned the cell off. But that wouldn't work either. She'd just call Sam. So back at Square One, he wondered again if calling her was a good idea at all.

And yet, he'd promised, or as close to a promise as he made in this world.

Ultimately thinking it would be a good idea to get this over and done with before Sam was out of the shower, he picked up his cell phone, ready to eat the minutes if he had to. Maybe she wouldn't call him back. She needed time to cool off, she'd said. He scrolled through the phone book—he really needed to clean that thing out again—found the number for the roadhouse, and hit the 'call' button before he could talk himself any further out of it. He listened for the second ring then hung up as promised.

Dean waited.

His lack of patience was quickly rewarded not thirty seconds later when his screen lit up announcing that Ellen was calling him back. His stomach lurched as his thumb reached for the button to answer her, telling him not to, but he did it anyway. Fool. He didn't say anything, but he could hear the bar noises in the distant background letting him know that she was out back in the office, away from prying eyes and ears.

"Where are you?" she asked quietly, motherly.

"Minnesota."

"What's up there?"

"A long overdue family thing," said Dean a little huskily. He had yet to explain to Sam what they were doing there. The last thing he wanted was to have his kid brother walk in on the middle of the conversation and find out that way. It was best to be vague as possible. "Dad wasn't the only soldier we lost that week."

Ellen didn't say anything at first, making Dean wonder exactly what was going on on her end. He didn't hear anything change in the background. He could still hear her breathing. If she was waiting for him to say something else, she wasn't going to get it at the moment, so what she was doing was a little beyond him. When her voice came back, it sounded a little thick as she said, "You're a good son, Dean. You're doing right by him." There was a beat as if she was recovering when she damned near snapped, "You two be careful or I'll wipe the sawdust off this floor with your scrawny asses the second you step through this door, you hear me?" Again another beat before she said, "Don't let it be too long before I hear from you." With that, Ellen and the sounds of shore-leaved hunters cut off, leaving Dean to marvel at the weirdness of the conversation and women altogether.

Steam rolled out of the bathroom when Sam finally came out to find his brother sitting on the bed staring at his cell phone. He didn't know how he knew, but he had the feeling that Dean had been sitting like that for quite a while. Carefully he asked, "Everything okay?"

"Women," said Dean both ruefully and thoughtfully.

"Ellen?"

"Women," Dean groaned.

"Moving on then," agreed Sam, knowing he would get nothing further. He hooked his thumb over his shoulder toward the door. "I need food. Philly's should still be serving if we get over there in the next two hours. Get your ass in the shower so we can go."

"Dude, Philly's hasn't been 'Philly's' in five years."

"You're kidding."

"Nope. It's a Mexican place now, and the way it sounds, we'd be confined to our beds for a week if we even thought about eating there."

"Okay, how about that Chinese place across from the library?"

"Gone even longer."

Sam rubbed at the back of his neck, wracking his brain to try to think of any place he could remember being in this town. "God, where did it all go? Where was I?"

"Town's dying," shrugged Dean, choosing to ignore the second question. If he gave his brother long enough, Sam would come up with the answer to that little obviosity all on his own. "Has been for a while, ever since that godawful-smelling packing plant went up in flames. I'm not that hungry anyway. Just call for a pizza or something. Godfather's will probably deliver if it isn't flooded out again."

Digging the rather slim phone book from the night stand drawer, Sam lamented to himself the loss of some of the best mushrooms he'd ever had, "The whole damned world is going to Hell in a handbasket."

"Tell me about it," said Dean, allowing himself to flop back onto his bed and hopefully catch a quick nap before the pizza came. As an afterthought he added, "No olives."

Two hours and two devoured pizzas later, they each lay sprawled on their own beds, Dean flipping through channels without really noticing what it was that he was flipping by in the first place. He finally gave up, turning the cable off without even a glance in his brother's direction. If Sam wanted to watch something that badly, he could pick the remote up himself.

For whatever reason, though, Sam didn't say anything. Dean knew he was awake. He knew his brother's breathing enough to know the difference, especially after sharing either rooms or beds with him for twenty plus years. He also knew that Sam didn't just lie there either. He had always been an antsy little shit. Yet there he was, lying flat on his back. Dean couldn't tell if his brother's eyes were open or closed, but at that point, it didn't matter that much. What mattered was that Sam was obviously thinking. With the way things had been going lately, that wasn't a good thing.

"Stop thinking," Dean ordered him.

"I'm not."

"Stop thinking, damn it."

"I'm not."

"Bullshit."

"Dean—"

"Sammy," Dean drawled, heavy on the sarcasm. You'd think he was trying to pull a tooth or something. He was used to this little dance, though. He wished like hell he didn't have to go through it every goddamned time. His patience had limits, especially when whatever his kid brother was thinking about obviously wasn't a matter of life or death. The fastest way was usually the rough way with Sam, so he inwardly cringed as he barked out, "I'm not in the mood, so start talking or stop moping. Either one is fine with me."

After a predicted hitched sigh, Sam did, in fact, start talking. "I'm worried about Jo. I should have gone after her when you were in there with Ellen. I shouldn't have let her leave like that."

"They'll work it out."

Sam's voice was deathly quiet as he said, "Will they? We didn't. I don't want them to end up like us. You and me, me and Dad, neither one. I don't want that for them . . . You say things, you know, that you don't mean. You fight and you fight until you don't remember what you're fighting about. I remember why it started, but I don't know why it started. I can't remember why it was that we started becoming people who couldn't just talk to each other. I can't remember when I stopped talking to him. I can't remember when he stopped listening. I can't remember when I started being okay with that. The first night that Jess and I were in our apartment, we got into this fight. It was that night I called you, you remember?"

Sam stopped then as if too many things were coming together for him in one big ball of pain. First their friends, then their father, then his girl. Everything always seemed to go in that direction. Dean didn't want it to end there, though, not when he needed to know what Sam was thinking just as much as Sam needed to say it. Too many things were always being left unsaid. Besides, if he didn't, Sam would keep moping and it would come up again anyway. Better to get it over and done with, rip off the Band-Aid in one fell swoop. He urged his brother on, saying quietly, "I remember."

"She was so mad at me that night, but it was different. I'd never had a fight like that before. It was the only real fight we ever had, but she never raised her voice once. I could tell she was mad, and I was scared that it was going to be too much, but she never yelled at me. And I was sitting there, telling her about you for the first time, trying to make her understand that it was my fault. You and Dad weren't there because of me, and I didn't want her to be mad at you for that. I never wanted her to hate either of you. I was okay with you not being there because I still missed you. I knew it was all still okay because I missed you. It was the day that I stopped missing you that I was worried about. That was the only reason I was able to call you. I still missed you and him and I was still too damned stubborn to say it. I had so many chances and I blew each and every one of them."

Sam waited for the sarcasm. He knew he'd probably crossed that line into the kind of thing that Dean didn't do very well at all. It was rare that Dean did any kind of real talking. He would turn it into something. Always did. Unless this was going to be one of those times when he secretly didn't mind being told something. Even Dean's ego needed petting now and then when it came to their tiny, broken family. So he waited for that punchline, that joke that would tell him it was okay to stop. When it didn't come, he decided this must be one of those times when Dean needed to hear something that made him feel needed. Dean would never admit to it, but Sam knew his brother better than he thought he did.

"If I had that last night to do over again, I wouldn't have left the way I did. I wouldn't have said some of the things I said to you or Dad. I still would have gone to school—I wouldn't have had Jess at all if I didn't—but I wouldn't have done it like that. I should . . . I should have told Jo that. I should have told her . . . When she figures this all out enough to regret it, I don't want her to be like me and not be able to apologize. I don't want her too afraid to go home. I—I never got to tell him I was sorry."

Dean rolled onto his side, propping his head up on one hand. He stared at his brother, waiting for Sam to follow suit. He knew if he kept quiet long enough, the kid would. He always did. It was scary how predictable Sam could be sometimes. When the kid finally did as expected, Dean gave him half a smile, mostly because he knew Sam needed it. He didn't exactly feel like smiling otherwise. "Dad knew. Okay? It sucks that neither one of you bothered to say anything, and I should have locked you two in a room together until you either fixed it or only one of you stubborn fucking idiots came out of it alive, but he knew."

He didn't expect the biting tone he got back from his brother and actually blinked when he heard Sam saying caustically, "The hell he did. Did you know I missed you? Did you have even a clue that I hated that I couldn't pick up the phone to just call you when I wanted to? Do you have any idea how much I hated it that night you came to get me and you asked if I would have picked up the phone if you'd called? I've hated myself for a lot of things over the last few years, but I haven't hated myself quite so much as I did right then to know that I made you think that I wouldn't give a damn if you were in a ditch somewhere. If I could make you think that, I can just imagine what Dad thought I thought about him. He died thinking I hated him, Dean, and if it weren't for the last year of trying to find him, you would have thought the same thing."

"We all did the best we could with a shitty situation," said Dean as if that explanation could make it all go away, excuse all of it. Sure, it had killed him that his brother didn't want him in his life anymore. It absolutely killed him not to have Sam there. But like they'd forced each other to say that night in Chicago, sometimes you just have to let someone you love go. It had to be okay because thinking about it any other way was something he couldn't do right now.

The room grew quiet again, heavy with Sam's breathing. Dean could tell he was struggling with something. He knew that silence. The thing was he didn't know if he wanted to know what this one was about. They were already in territory that he didn't want to be in. He'd expected it after the Ellen/Jo blowout, but that didn't mean that he wanted to be here. Dad hurt too much yet. And talking about him was going to be hard enough over the next few days. Sam didn't know that yet, but still. He was prepared for doing it then, not now.

"Dean?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm going to say something you're not going to like or want to hear, but I'm going to say it. After that, I don't want to talk about it any more than you're going to want to talk about it. I'm going to change the subject when I'm done and you're just going to have to live with it. End of story." Sam took a quick breath to steel himself but didn't give Dean long enough to argue. "That night in the cabin with The Demon, none of what it said was true. Dad didn't play favorites, and we do need you. I need you. I wouldn't have survived losing Jess without you. I wouldn't have survived a lot of things without you. You are not expendable. That demon can go fuck himself for even thinking that either of us thinks that about you. And if I ever get the impression that you listened to a word that sonofabitch had to say, I will kick your ass so hard you'll just plain be dead."

"You're going to kick my ass? In what bizarro alternate universe?"

Sam ignored his brother's retort so that he could say ever so quietly, "It occurs to me that I never told you that I'm sorry for leaving you. I know that's not how I think of it, but I know that's how you think of it, and I'm sorry for that. I never wanted you to think that I could handle you not being in my life. For that part, I'm sorry." Then as promised, Sam changed the subject by taking the pillow out from under his head and whipping it at his brother. With a cough to clear any sign of emotion out of his throat at all, Sam said, "So tell me what we're doing here, because I can't help but notice that we don't have a job to work, and we're more than just a little close to a certain safehouse that we haven't been to in a really long time now."

Dean sat up and swung his legs over the edge of the bed so that he could get a better look at his brother. Part of this trip hinged on their ability to be able to talk about a few things that they had done a fairly good job of avoiding. He needed to be able to actually see that Sam was ready to deal with this, especially since he didn't think himself entirely ready. That Sam, the one who did the whole talking, get-in-touch-with-your-inner-child thing (Jessica's fault, he was sure), was quick to change the subject wasn't exactly a good sign. At the same time, one of them had to have a decent amount of control on this one. Somehow, he had a feeling it wasn't going to be him. He thrust the pillow right back down on his brother's middle and said simply, "Yeah."

"We're going?"

"It's what Dad would have wanted us to do," said Dean, hating that he was throwing those words in his brother's face still far too soon after having snapped at him for using them. "Are you going to be okay with that?"

"Are we going down to Lincoln after or just to Pastor Jim's?"

"Pastor Jim's tomorrow, and depending on whether or not Kay holds us hostage, down to Caleb's either tomorrow or the day after." Sam was quiet for a moment. Dean could practically see the wheels in that geek brain of his turning, figuring out twenty different things at once. After awhile he asked again, needing an honest assessment, "Are you going to be okay with this?"

"Are you?"

Again Sam was quiet, knowing that they both knew the answer to the other's question. Of course it wasn't going to be okay, but that didn't mean that they didn't still have a responsibility. He didn't look at his brother as he asked, "That bar still open, or has that place gone the way of the dodo, too?"

"I'm driving."

---

The half an hour that it took to drive to Blue Earth the next morning was damn painful. Dean was feeling guilty and he wasn't even there yet. They drank and talked well into the night trying to decide exactly how they were going to deal with all of this. The plan was fairly straightforward. Pastor Jim's would be more like a quiet pit stop; Caleb's would be the over-nighter. Depending on how things went with Caleb's widow, they may be stopping by Pastor Jim's again on the way to Wherever, too. The guilt in Dean's gut told him that it wasn't a 'depending' situation already. He was going to need to stop by. He just wasn't about to tell his brother that quite yet.

Sam drove the car around the block that was home to the church a few times, looking for all the world like a criminal casing the joint. The nosy little old lady in the white house across the street probably ticked off the number of times he'd circled around, ready to call 911 the instant she heard communion chalices being thrown in a thief's duffel bag. After living her entire life with only her cats, she had quite the imagination. Jim had always found her funny, even when she would call in to emergency services when she'd see one of the Winchesters' vehicles pull into the parking lot in the middle of the night. He had usually found the humor in just about anything.

That was why he was one of the good guys, thought Dean wryly. God, I miss him already.

As if he was reading his brother's mind, Sam asked, "Think good ol' Mrs. Hanson called the plates in yet?"

"Nah. She loves us," Dean said, and as they drove by her house one more time, he offered a short, sarcastic wave in the direction of her windows. The curtains suddenly fell back into place. Turning back to his brother, he said, "Let's get in there. The sooner we get this over with the better."

The echoes of their footfalls in the church's hallway never failed to bother Dean. He couldn't help it. His entire life, he'd been taught to not announce his presence to anyone but his father and brother (and others if they were involved in the hunt). It went against everything he knew. Still, the clompy-clomp wasn't such a bad sound today. It was something familiar, something that didn't make this place feel so not theirs. This place had been a sanctuary for so long for them that without Pastor Jim it felt like they were trespassing somehow. It wasn't theirs anymore. A lot of things weren't.

It had been six months since the last time they'd been there, but now that renovations had begun, all of the scaffolding and hanging plastic had turned the building into a maze. Dean was grateful for all of the time that he and Sam had entertained themselves with hide-and-seek in the hallways or they never would have found their way to the set of offices that ran the everyday operations of the church.

Sam was the one to make the first move, hesitating only with a shaky breath before knocking on the doorjamb to call the attention of the sweet, sweet woman separated from the doorway by a room-length counter area. Without looking up at her guests, the woman held up the index finger of her right hand, indicating for them to wait. She finished typing up whatever she was working on, wrote something on a bright yellow Post-It, and stuck it on the monitor of her computer before peering over the rims of her glasses to see who had interrupted her. She startled a moment as if she wasn't sure what she was seeing. She took off her glasses, folded the bows, and let them fall to her chest on their chain. With a yelp of happiness that trimmed ten years off her seventy, she pushed her chair back and came around to the front, lifting the panel that allowed her escape from what was otherwise Cubical Land.

She stood before them, smiling at them both. She reached for their outside hands and held them tightly, swallowing hard. Tearfully she greeted them, "My boys."

"Hey, Kay," said Sam with a sheepish smile, bending over enough to plant a kiss on her cheek.

Dean stood back a little further, free hand stuffed in his jacket pocket, and charmed her as if he were still twelve years old. "Lookin' good, Lady."

Again she said joyously, "My boys. God, oh God, my boys!"

"Sorry we didn't call ahead," said Sam.

"Nonsense. You've never called ahead a day in your lives. If you did, I think I might die of shock." The kind older woman's face fell as she looked the two men over, obviously seeing something that they didn't know about. She looked over her shoulder at the only other secretary in the office to make sure she was occupied then said in a low, sad whisper, "You're here about Jim."

"You," Sam said quickly, trying to smile. "We're here for you."

Kay crinkled her eyebrows at Sam. She obviously knew better. "Don't you lie to me, young man. I know why you're here. You are your father's sons, enough said. But it isn't something that we should be discussing here. Even these walls have ears that shouldn't be privy to the kinds of things we know, even in the daylight."

"We don't have to do anything right now," offered Dean. He knew springing their arrival on her was going to be the best way to get things started, but he also hadn't been prepared for how much it was going to hit him being in the church knowing that Pastor Jim wasn't anywhere in the building that had kept them safe so many times in his life. He wasn't ready to tell her that either. "Why don't we—"

"I've got some cookies in the office that I made just last night. I didn't know why, but I felt like I needed to bake. I guess now I know why." Almost distractedly the woman said, "You boys need to eat. I know life on the road is a little tight, but you kids still need to eat better than you do."

"We're okay," said Sam immediately.

"Nonsense. You don't come all this way to see this old woman and then break her heart not letting her cook for you. At the very least, you're going to let me fix you up some sandwiches downstairs. You aren't walking out of here without something. You stay right here." She made her way back to her computer, shoved the mouse around in a few directions, then waved over her shoulder at the woman at the printer and said, "Jenny, I'm in the building, but I'm taking the rest of the day. Don't worry about locking up. See you tomorrow."

"You betcha, Kay. Have fun."

They made their way back through the labyrinth that had become of the church, making small talk all along the way until they reached Fellowship Hall down in the basement. Dean flinched at the sight of it when Kay flipped on the lights, immediately remembering an ill-conceived water pistol war that had ravaged the hall when they were supposed to be making up sandwiches for everyone doing the research. About the only thing that hadn't been drenched in water were the two of them since they had been taught at a very young age to never ever point guns at each other if they wanted to be able to sit for a week. Guns were for spooks and only spooks. Apparently all of the draperies had been evil and needed to be doused with holy water. Pastor Jim had laughed and sent out for pizza instead.

Dean shook himself out of the memory and double-timed it to catch up to where Kay and Sam had disappeared into the kitchen. Sam gave him a questioning look of concern which Dean returned with a bright grin. "I have two words for you: Super. Soaker."

Sam glanced back through the catering window into the room and saw the same overturned tables and dripping curtains in his mind that he knew his brother had seen. His shoulders shrugged with his chuckles. "Yeah."

Kay smiled at them, sad to see what she knew to be a happy memory for the two men now turned into something so bittersweet. She was a smart woman; she knew why they were here. Rather than let things get too difficult for any of them, she busied herself making them sandwiches so that they could all get to the business of saying 'Goodbye'. "So we pretty much discussed everything there is to know about me. My life hasn't exactly changed much in forty-seven years. Tell me what you've been up to. We haven't heard from you in months. Did you find your father yet?"

Dean caught that 'we' the same way Sam did. She was still saying 'we'. It was killing Dean to hear her talking to them so calmly, falling into the same old Kay that they had known her to be their entire lives. Granted, she hadn't had a family of her own. She had created one with Pastor Jim and all of their little strays (as she called them). Jim was the closest thing she would have had to a husband. Dean had never doubted that the day he was gone would feel devastating to her, but he didn't expect her to be like this. He didn't know exactly what he had expected, but it wasn't cookies and sandwiches. She was trying so hard, and here he was going to have to crush that anyway. He and Sam glanced at each other, and as had been the habit lately, Sam took the sword to the gut.

"Yeah, we found him. I take it no one told you yet?"

"Oh, I'm so glad. It broke my heart the last time you kids were here. Every time you called or stopped by on your way wherever, I hated seeing you drive away without any answers. It was hard for Jim, too. The three of you were in our prayers every morning," the woman said. With a smirk in Dean's direction, she added, "Even though we knew your father would hate knowing that. He's a stubborn one, that father of yours. But a few prayers he doesn't know about aren't going to kill him."

"Kay," started Sam with his eyes dead locked on his brother's for a moment. He needed the reminder that they were doing this for a reason, for her. He hung his head, bracing himself even though he knew she couldn't see him while she continued to dig things out of the cupboards. He looked back up at her back, hard and damned near broken so that Dean couldn't even look at him while his kid brother said, "Um, Dad didn't make it."

The sound of the still-sealed Miracle Whip jar hitting the floor stunned them all as if the devil himself had knocked on their door.

She didn't turn to look at them as she asked, "When?"

"A couple of days after Jim, we think. We aren't entirely sure how everything played out ourselves," Sam explained, seeing that Dean was bouncing his leg nervously. He hadn't been so good with the talking about Dad stuff yet. Sam was the one who had words, not him. "Dad went to deal with the demons after they killed Caleb and—"

"Caleb, too?"

"Nobody's called you at all?" Dean bugged his eyes in anger and disbelief, flickering them between Sam and Kay. What the hell was going on here? When did their group fall so apart that no one had thought to call Kay and let her at least know what was going on? Where was Joshua? Jefferson? Anybody? Bobby at least had an excuse; he'd been busy tending to them both during and after everything went down. But the rest of them had no excuses. None. "Kay?"

The woman didn't turn around, but from the spot she was suddenly frozen to she said, "I thought something might have happened when I didn't hear from any of you after Caleb left. He's the one who found Jim, you know. He came to get me so that we could remove all of the weaponry from the room before calling the police. We didn't want questions, you see. Caleb wanted to take Jim with him so that he could do things properly, but Jim couldn't just disappear, not in this town. As much as I think we all would have wanted it that way, he couldn't disappear without questions. So we cleaned everything up, he called his wife, and then he left to get back to Lincoln. He was going to stay with me, but something your father said made him want to get out of here as fast as possible. He said that I should be all right but to find someplace to hide out until he called anyway. That was the last I heard from anyone."

Sam turned to Dean, slowly piecing together the timeline in comparison to everything that they had gone through. "By the time he called us, he must have been pretty close to home then. We weren't at the motel more than half an hour before splitting up."

"And you came back to the motel probably four hours in," Dean worked out. "So she must have been waiting for him at the house." He blocked out the remembered look of horror on his father's face as he'd listened to their friend die over the phone and instead breathed out with something that sounded like relief. "It must have been pretty quick then. From the time he called us to the time she called, it couldn't have been more than six hours. It was quick."

The idea that his brother was searching for some kind of comfort right now was not in the least bit encouraging to Sam. As soon as he'd heard what Dean's plans were for the next few days, Sam's stomach had been in knots. He knew he wasn't ready to do this. If he wasn't ready, Dean certainly wasn't. They hadn't said anything since Dean's confession on the roadside, but that didn't mean he couldn't still see his brother struggling with an inordinate amount of guilt. This was the last thing he needed. Needing his brother to stop talking and quickly, Sam called for his attention with disgusted force. "Dean?"

"Right. Sorry."

Sam blinked at that one. Sorry? Wasn't that his line? Dean was never sorry—well, except that one time a few weeks ago, but that was a special circumstance. It had been a full five weeks in coming on that one. This was different.

Dean could feel his brother staring at him like he was trying to read his mind. He hated it when Sam looked at him like that. He was the only one allowed to do that, damn it. Big brother prerogative. To get that look off his kid brother's face, Dean suddenly launched himself from his position atop the counter and went to where he knew the mops and such were hiding in the kitchen. Lord knows he and Sam had played enough hide and seek games in this place to know where everything was. Things didn't exactly change much in a small town church like this. He hefted the rolling bucket over the lip of the cleaning cabinet and dragged it over to the sink, lowered the hose into it, and started filling. No one said anything while he busied himself, for which he was kind of grateful. Better to let him get himself back on track. This trip wasn't about his guilt; it was about Kay and Al's comfort. He was going to have to do a better job keeping his trap shut from now on was all.

He gave his brother a look, commanding Sam to get his ass off the counter and get their dear old friend away from the mess on the floor. She had yet to make a move since the news of their father's death had hit her. The sight of the grandest woman he knew standing there stunned in a mess of mayonnaise was not something he could stomach for very long at all. Besides, the smell was making him nauseous. He'd be lucky to make it through the next few days without finally developing an ulcer. It wasn't like that one wasn't a long time in coming.

Thankfully, Sam did as told. He hopped off the counter and went over to the closest thing either of them knew to what a grandmother would be like. He put his hands on her shoulders and pulled her back a ways so that Dean could get in there with the mop. She seemed to resist his pull for a half a second until she finally let him hug her from behind. From where he was standing, Dean could see her face buried under a sheen of tears. God, how he hated to see her cry.

"I always knew I'd live to see Jim buried," Kay told them in the voice of a grieving widow. "As much as I wished it weren't true for you boys, I thought I'd live to bury your father as well. Caleb, too. I think they depended on me for it, you see. They knew they would need someone who could do it for them who wasn't you or little Miss Alice. You boys especially, I was worried for. Children are supposed to bury their parents, but I knew it was going to come too soon for you. I was prepared for it. I wasn't prepared for it to be all in one week."

Sam helped her to sit down on one of the stools that rounded the island counter in the middle of the industrial kitchen. He gave her a gentle smile to let her know that she was far from alone, which was, after all, their entire reason for being there in the first place. Even though he knew he should be thinking about Pastor Jim at the moment, he couldn't allow himself to think of anything other than Kay's sadness. They would have to try to fix that first. His voice was remarkably steady as he told her, "None of us were prepared. Our entire lives had been leading us to that one week and we still weren't prepared. I don't think any of us realized until we were there that there was nothing we could have done to prepare ourselves for that."

"I took care of everything myself," said Kay strongly, as if she'd rehearsed how she would say this to them the day that they were able to come to her. "Jim's orders were specific, which I'm sure you can imagine. The mortuary was a little confused why I asked them to cover him in salt before he was cremated, but eventually I got them to agree. God help me, I stayed to make sure they did it correctly. I had the ground consecrated before his ashes could be buried. He's safe, boys. He'll always be safe."

Sam reached a hand over to the woman's knee and squeezed, his casual way with people a trick he had learned long ago starting with her. "I'm sorry we weren't here to do it for you. We wanted to be here. If we had had a choice, we would have been here with you."

"Nonsense," Kay said. "Jim was my responsibility, not yours. I agreed to burying him long before either of you was born. I always knew it would be a demon that would get to him. I didn't expect it to happen quite yet, but I expected it. We both knew I'd outlive him. We planned for that." She covered Sam's hand with hers and added, "It's yours I'm afraid to have missed. I'm so sorry about your father. He was a good man."

From behind them, Dean accepted the condolences with a flinch, as had been the custom so far. Sam was the one who was good at doing that sort of thing. Dean was good at letting his little brother be good at it. Sam hadn't exactly fought the undiscussed system yet, so it must be working. Dean went right on mopping harder and harder, not trusting himself to say anything anyway. Right on cue, Sam said for them both, "Thanks. Dad always liked you, you know."

"And I him, hard as he was to like," the woman said kindly. "Let's face facts here, boys. Your dad wasn't going to win any congeniality contests, but he sure knew how to melt this ice queen's heart." A secret grin spread over her once-pretty features, giving her a look like she was the tough young broad they knew she must have been. "No matter what you might hear about him, that man was a charm-mer. Uff-dah. Of all the things he drilled into you boys, that was the best part of him he gave to you."

Needing to end this moment and fast, Dean let his face light up as much as he could and teased her, "Ice queen? I would go more with 'Dragon Lady' or 'Battle Axe' I think."

Kay didn't bother even looking in Dean's direction. She didn't bother to slap him or kick his shins. Instead, her eyebrow popped up, warning of conspiracy. "Sam?"

"Yeah?"

"Your brother doesn't get any cookies."

"Ouch!" Dean grumped, actually feeling the sting of punishment in that one. Kay had always made the best cookies he'd ever had, excepting his mother's, of course.

"Let the punishment fit the crime," Kay singsonged, obviously recovered and willing to move on. Her grief had had two months to fester. Her boys were what was important now.

"Yes, ma'am," said Sam with a childlike grin plastered all over his face.

Dean rolled his eyes and quietly excused himself, leaving Sam to empty the chunky water from the bucket. He needed a minute. He wandered around the back of the banquet room and up the brick staircase. He knew the place so well, but it somehow felt foreign to him. He wondered oddly if the church knew Jim was gone, too.

He found himself sitting in a pew in the back of the main sanctuary. He had liked sitting in there as a teenager watching Pastor Jim instruct his confirmation classes. He could almost picture his friend sitting on the marble steps that led up to the altar and pulpit chatting away. Pastor Jim had never been one for formality when it came to teaching. He was much more comfortable on the stairs, sitting just as lazily as his parishioners. He would look back at Dean sometimes as if he wondered what the kid thought about what he was saying. They would talk about it sometimes after. Those weren't the talks that Dean missed, though. He missed Pastor Jim for the real talks, the ones that mattered to him. Whether it worked or not, Pastor Jim had always tried to help things make sense. He really missed that. He could use some sense right about now.

When Dean was eight, Sam had asked him if God hated him. Not Dean him, Sam him. After getting his brother safely to bed, the question answered the only way he knew how to answer it—Don't be stupid, Sammy, nobody hates you—Dean had gone in search of Pastor Jim.

Does God hate my brother?

Why would he ask something like that?

He wasn't. Sam was. Dean couldn't care less what God thought of him, but it mattered to Sam, and since Pastor Jim obviously got along better with God than he did, he wanted an answer.

Pastor Jim had always been a better listener than God anyway.

When Dad and Sam had really started going at it on a weekly basis, it was Pastor Jim who kept Dean together. Not that Dean needed keeping together. They were his family and he'd take care of it. But if Pastor Jim had the time to explain a few things, that would be okay, too.

Why didn't he ever get mad at them when they were kids?

Why didn't he ever really get mad at them now that they were almost adults?

Why does God hate my brother, Pastor Jim? Why was it so wrong for him to be in love that this had to happen? Give me a good reason why this god seems to think my brother doesn't deserve to be happy. Shouldn't at least one of us get the chance to be happy?

Shouldn't you still be here to give me answers, you sonofabitch? You really suck for leaving us like this.

The guy who was standing in the pulpit fiddling with index cards didn't seem to notice Dean until he'd shifted too quickly and rammed his knee into the hymnal rack on the back of the pew ahead of him. The question had come immediately.

"Can I help you?"

"That's okay. Thanks."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, thanks."

The pastor's attention dipped back to his index cards, but his voice dropped quite a bit so that Dean couldn't hear him mumbling out the details of his sermon anymore. Every few minutes, though, his eyes would look up for Dean, waiting for the younger man to demand some attention. He almost looked disappointed when he was done and ready to leave that Dean had not asked him for anything.

Newbie.

Not Jim.

Never could be.

He left Dean sitting there alone, much to Dean's relief. Pastor Jim was irreplaceable. For this guy to even look at him right now felt like an invasion. He wasn't going to let that happen, not ever. His stare followed the pastor through a door at the back of the altar near the baptismal fountain, cold and hard and in no way unmistakable. He wanted to be left alone.

He wasn't sure how long he got to himself before Sam came looking, but it didn't feel like it had been long enough. Then again, Goodbye never really seemed to go the way you wanted. Sam sat next to him without saying anything at all. It was kind of nice, actually, to have Sam be at least a little patient with him. He'd been doing that a lot lately. Dean hoped Sam knew that he appreciated it. They both knew what he needed to do and that Sam would be right by his side to do it, but it didn't feel like it was time yet. He needed more time.

Sam did eventually break the silence, but not in a pressuring kind of way for once. "Kay went home to change the sheets. She's not letting us out of town tonight. Dinner will be ready at six."

"Bossy old broad," said Dean fondly.

"I'm telling her you said that," chuckled Sam. "You've already lost cookie privileges. Are you sure you want to push it?"

Dean's response was to shove himself out of the pew and take very deliberate, heavy steps toward where he knew the staircase was. No one went down there, no one but Jim and his strays. The three associate pastors had known that. They all had offices down the hall off the right of the narthex, but his was the only one that was not ever open. No one questioned it either. Pastor Jim was one tough bastard when he wanted things a certain way. He ran a tight ship, no questions asked.

Sam followed closely behind, thinking pretty much the same things as they descended the stairs they had both fallen down on a few occasions as children. It usually meant they were dragging their hurt father along with them, but still. At the bottom of the stairs, he nearly ran into Dean, who had come to a very sudden stop.

"Aw, Jim," came the low groan.

The door had been pretty much blown off its hinges. The church staff had simply thrown two large sheets of plywood over the entrance to keep it closed from prying eyes. The congregation had all, naturally, been curious about the murder of the local man of god. It wasn't something that happened in a town like theirs, ever. The church had done their best to keep things quiet, give respect to Pastor Murphy's private business, but there was only so much that they could do.

A heat spread over Dean's cheeks, along with the rest of him. He grabbed the makeshift door that was just laying at an angle braced at the top of the doorframe and flipped it around with a bang. He took a deep breath and stalked into the chamber that Pastor Jim had used both as an office and as a sanctuary. The wall that had housed all of his weapons had been pillaged, although he was pretty sure that was by Caleb, so he was more upset by the emptiness of it than the idea that they were missing. Papers were strewn over the floor, some of them stuck together with what was obviously blood. There were demure boot prints dotting the floor, an ugly red stain of Meg's defiling of so many things in the room. One chair was lying legs up while the other sat ominously empty. Everything else about the room was the same way. All of the books save six different copies of the Bible in six different languages were gone. There was no evidence of anyone having made the room a place of safety. There was no evidence of the childhood Dean and Sam had spent in that room with their friend and father quietly playing while the adults either argued, worked, or both.

"You'd never know this was his," said Sam as if he could read his brother's thoughts.

Dean nodded, not really trusting himself to say anything in return. Instead he walked through the room, a hand running tenderly over the empty shelves as he went along. When he thought he'd be able to talk without losing command of his voice, he said, "I doubt Caleb missed anything, but we should check anyway."

"You take the desk. I'll get the cubbies."

Caleb had done a thorough job considering how quickly he must have done it. That, or he'd set Kay to the job to keep her occupied. Either way, there was nothing in that room that could have given any indication to the uninitiated of the life that Jim Murphy led. There was no trace of Jim in there anyway. At least, not their Pastor Jim. The room felt really cold knowing that.

"Do you think they cleaned out the bibles?" asked Sam after awhile.

A ghost of a smile curled Dean's mouth. He'd nearly forgotten Jim's 'safes'. "Probably not."

When the job was done, there was probably a good three thousand dollars hidden away between the pages of the multiple bibles that remained on the splintered shelves. Dean let out a low whistle. "Wow."

"That'll pay a few bills."

"How much was in ours?" asked Dean, nodding toward the Latin translation that generally only Pastor Jim and Sam would read for reasons beyond necessity.

"Another two grand," said Sam. "He must have been worried about us."

"He was always worried," said Dean quietly. That was something he had always understood about Pastor Jim better than everyone, maybe even a little better than their father. But then, that's why he and Pastor Jim had gotten along so well. They both were big brothers of a sort. They had to understand each other. Pastor Jim took care of Dad the way Dean took care of Sam. It was their respective jobs to worry. That's all there was to it. "Even when you were gone, he was worried. He and Dad had some pretty big fights about you that first year."

"They did?"

Dean watched Sam's eyes grow sentimental, kind of like the time they were in Lawrence and he'd heard about their escape from the fire for what had apparently been the first time. For a guy smart enough to get a full ride to a school like Stanford, Sam could be awfully ignorant sometimes. It was like he didn't think anyone gave a damn about him enough to talk about him when he wasn't in the room. It struck Dean as weird, considering how touchy-feely Sam could be sometimes. He figured the kid knew he was everyone's favorite. It was hard not to notice sometimes. He was the baby of the entire surrogate family, so to speak. Of course people worried about him. What did he think they were? Heartless?

He shrugged, not really wanting to get into it too much. He had already said too much. Hoping that it would be enough to satisfy his brother's curiosity for a while, he shrugged it off casually. "They always worked it out. And when they couldn't, Dad would cool off for a week before he called back up here. They'd talk and they'd be fine. It's not like they could ever really stay mad at each other. It was okay."

Not letting go of the idea, Sam said quietly, "I knew you and Dad fought about it, but I didn't think . . . I guess never imagined anyone else bothered you guys about it. Nobody called to yell at me."

"Of course not. They called to yell at me and Dad."

"What?"

Dean sighed. "What did you think was going to happen? That you'd go off and no one would give it a second thought? Of course everyone was worried. You weren't answering your phone, and you couldn't be bothered to let anyone know that you were okay. Yeah, we were worried. Everybody respected your decision to go. They did. I think even Dad did when he really thought about it. But the way you did it, the way Dad did it, it ticked a lot of people off. The way it looked to them, Dad screwed up in the worst way possible. The way it looked to us, you turned your back on your family. I'm not saying that's how I think of it now, but back then? Pastor Jim, Caleb, Bobby, they were all mad. But they were mad because they were worried. You're the baby, Sam. They're always going to worry, no matter what you do."

"But I screwed it up. Me and Dad, we screwed it up. Why would they blame you?"

Fixing his brother with a You've Gotta Be Kidding Me stare, Dean said to the contrary, "If you can't figure that one out, you need to go back to that college of yours and get smart again." Quickly changing the subject, he asked, "So two grand, huh? I sense many, many rainy days ahead." He slammed shut the cover of the bible in his hands, put it back on the shelf relatively reverently—only because Pastor Jim had always made sure they had handled the books with utmost care, whether they believed in them or not—and tipped his chin toward the makeshift doors. "We should get the rest of it to Kay. She'll know what Jim would want to do with it."

Dean didn't wait for an answer and damned near sprinted to get out of Pastor Jim's sanctuary for the last time. There was nothing left there for him but memories that he didn't necessarily want to deal with anyway. The sounds of his and Sam's boots echoing on the floors was even louder than it had been coming into the church now, if only because it was magnified by the pounding in his chest. He knew he was doing the right thing. This was duty. That didn't mean that this entire excursion into Amnesia Lane didn't completely suck.

They didn't stop at the cemetery. That place, as Dean put it, wasn't for them. It was for Kay and for people who didn't know the things they knew. Pastor Jim would understand.

The rest of the drive over to Kay's was incredibly quiet as they both took in the town for what was most likely going to be the last time for a long, long time. Dean had always liked Blue Earth. Not that he ever really thought about it seriously, but if he did ever think about actually settling down and having a life away from hunting full time, he liked it here. The town was nice and quiet with a lot of post World War II style houses, just small enough for the price but big enough for starting a life. Kids could actually play out in the street in the summer. Kids didn't meet in playgroups. They met because they found each other yelling in the streets. People were nice and generally left you to your own business. He liked that. He was going to miss this place. All of it.

Dinner was just as fabulous as they both remembered. Kay mothered them like nobody's business for a few hours, making things seem almost normal. The only things missed were John and Pastor Jim. The conversation was carefully steered away from even remotely touching the subject of That Week even though now and then one of their missing men's names would come up in relation to one thing or another.

It wasn't until Kay was too tired to keep herself awake any longer that the uneasiness settled over the room. The older woman sounded rather sad when she asked, "Will you still be here in the morning, or do you have to get on the road?"

"We'll make an early start, but not until you head back to work," volunteered Sam without even glancing at Dean. He knew his brother would agree. And if he didn't, well . . .

Kay fixed both of her boys with a motherly stare, so incredibly vulnerable. "When the time comes, I won't say goodbye. As far as I'm concerned, you will come back here one of these days. Tomorrow morning will not be any different than any other time you boys have been here. You understand me? No goodbyes."

"Yes, ma'am," said Dean quietly. His tone said his goodbye for him. The look she gave him told him she knew that that was exactly what he'd intended.

"Same here," said Sam, subsequently receiving the same sad look.

A resigned smile came over the woman's face. Dean wasn't sure if the light in her eyes was from the lamp itself or the light reflecting off her tears. In a blink, they were clear again, nodding off toward the stairs. "You boys get on upstairs now. Sam, you take your father's usual room. Dean, yours is the same. You know where the towels are."

"What about you?" asked Sam.

"I'll be up in a while. I should lock up."

"I can do that for you," offered Dean gently.

"I know how to salt a doorway, young man. Now get yourselves upstairs."

"Yes, ma'am," grinned Dean, this time meaning it. He loved that woman. They didn't make them like her anymore. He was definitely going to miss her.

In the morning, The Brothers Winchester kept their promise not to say Goodbye . . . as least to their dear old friend's face. What they said with their hearts was more than goodbye. As Sam purred the car's engine in her driveway then pulled off down the street without looking back, they both guessed she knew the same thing.

They'd never been able to lie to Kay. Not really.

This was what goodbye for real with people you loved felt like. They'd never done it with people who weren't dead. So far, neither of them liked it too much.

---

When they pulled up in front of the hundred year old farm house eight hours later, Dean sat quietly in the driver's seat for a moment before letting the engine cut. It wasn't a long moment, but it was long enough that Sam looked at him sideways, wondering what was going through his brother's head.

"You okay?"

"She's gonna hate us for the rest of her life," said Dean quietly, regretfully. "She's gonna hate us, and there's nothing we can do about it. It sucks. She's gonna be one of the hard ones to let go of, you know? It's not like we had that many to begin with."

Sam ran his free hand through his hair, letting that speak for his understanding. Of course it was going to be hard. They wouldn't have put this off for two damned months if it was going to be a joyride at the county fair. Forcing himself to reach for his door handle before he let their mutual lack of nerve talk him out of this, he bumped his casted fist sideways into his brother's bicep. "Let's get this over with. She's been waiting long enough."

They got out of the safety of the car at the same time, feeling a chill in the air as they did. They both looked around out of habit, checking out the surroundings. The grass looked like it hadn't been cut in nearly two months, which, considering, wasn't all that unlikely. The old porch swing was swaying back and forth, riderless except for a deceptively angry-looking cat. Leaves stirred on the ground as a breeze blew through the trees, kicking up little bugs from the sand along the way. Everything looked fairly normal, though. It was just so quiet. That house was never quiet. Either Al had music blaring or Caleb was banging around out back or both. Things were never this quiet. Neither of them said a word, but from the looks on both their faces, something really wasn't right.

Dean took the first of the rotting wooden steps up to the porch with a tentative look at the cat. When she fixed him with a stare right back, he cocked a smile at her. The little gray ball of fur leapt off the swing and came up to him, allowing the familiar man to pick her up and play with her ears. Softly he asked, "Hey, Minion. Where is she, huh?"

"Al," called Sam, peering in through the front door screen. The front door was wide open, leaving only the screen door to keep the bugs out. "Al? You in there?"

Sam looked back at Dean holding their friend's cat now just a little tighter than he meant to. "Out back?"

"She would have come up front as soon as she heard the car," Sam said. He reached for the screen door and pulled the handle with shaky fingers. Something wasn't right. Al would never have left the house this open, no matter what. Windows, sure, as long as there were spindles in the windowsill to prevent them from being opened any further than she wanted them to be. And there would be salt in all of the sills on top of it. The heavy oak doors were always shut, always locked. Two shotguns always hung from a rack right on the inside of the doorway, one loaded with consecrated iron, the other with rock salt (Thank you, Dean Winchester). To a stranger it was overkill, but in their line of work it was precaution and nothing more. Al was careful. She'd learned a long time ago to be careful. Sam creaked the screen door open, looked up to where he knew the rack to be, and found only one weapon in its assigned slot. This was so not right in so many ways. He called out her name again urgently. "ALICE!"

Dean continued to stroke the cat's ears, hoping it would get rid of his own uneasy feeling. Not willing to give in to the paranoia that he knew was a logical next step for him he shrugged, "Maybe she went to the store or something. The girl's gotta eat."

"When have you ever known her to leave the house unlocked? And open?"

Dean didn't answer as Sam brushed passed him and went back to the car. Retrieving two loaded shotguns from the trunk, he charged back up the stairs, passing one of the weapons over without even looking. Dean set the cat down and opened the screen door, allowing his brother to go first. They began a quick search of the house starting there on the first floor. As they crossed into each room, one of them would yell for their friend, warning her that they were coming in and not to shoot.

When they finally found her staring almost sightlessly ahead from a rocking chair in what was looking to be yet another remodel of the master bedroom, Dean didn't know whether to hug her or kill her. Without thinking about it, he blurted angrily, "Damn it. You couldn't hear us yelling our heads off for you? Why didn't you answer?"

The blonde woman didn't blink as she said with barely any air at all, "I thought you'd leave if I waited long enough."

"Are you okay?" Sam asked patiently, countering his brother's frustrated huffs. He reached for her, but she shook her head and held up her hands to keep him at bay. Sinking back a little but still running his eyes over her to find any sign of what was wrong, he asked gently, "What happened?"

"Sorry," she said, blinking furiously and shaking her head and shoulders, getting rid of whatever it was that had had her staring so silently. "It doesn't matter." Refocusing herself, Al took in the two men in front of her and smiled brightly, the vestiges of her tears gone as if by magic. "You two are a sight for sore eyes."

Without thinking about it, Dean answered naturally, "Well, I know I am, but you must need to fix up that prescription of yours if you think the kid here is anything but an eyesore."

"I didn't say you were a good sight," she threw back at him. She looked them both up and down, actually assessing their appearances, and asked, "What the hell are you two doing here? You look like shit."

"Just passing through," Sam lied, even though he knew Al knew perfectly well why they were there. She wouldn't have been hiding out from them otherwise. He wasn't nearly as close to her as Dean—another casualty of those years at school—but he still knew her well enough to read her. If nothing else, he could read Dean, who was obviously trying to avoid the subject. Whether that was his choice or hers, Sam didn't know yet, but it was the road they were taking. Ignoring his concern since she still hadn't come out of the chair, he apologized, "Sorry for not calling ahead. It was sort of spur of the moment."

"Where're you headed?"

"New Orleans," said Sam while Dean said, "Phoenix."

Al eyed them both and didn't bother to lie to herself or them any longer. They all knew exactly why the two of them were there. She wasn't stupid. She stood up and started for the door, brushing past them without looking at them. When she reached the door, she turned around and warned them with a hard voice, "Not in here. I won't do that in here."

Sam didn't say anything, but his lips tightened in a grimace. He shook his head once then started out of the room, following the quiet footfalls that were already landing on the creaky old stairs. He only exchanged a look with his brother on the way, one that they both knew said it for them both.

Fuck.

Dean pulled the door shut behind him, not wanting to see the room that would never be filled again, not even in passing. Seeing her in that room had been bad enough. Being in that house was hard enough. Like they had at Pastor Jim's, the walls, he swore, were moving in on him. They were so loaded with memories that they couldn't stand on their own anymore. If he didn't need so badly to keep it together for Sam and their girls, he didn't think he'd be able to stay on his feet himself. It was all too heavy. Oddly, he wondered if that was how death felt—heavy. He wasn't sure if he wished he could remember or not.

Suddenly, he could think of nothing but getting out from under the weight. Catching up to his brother and friend, he forced a smile into his eye and suggested, "What do you say we get out of here for a while? Huh? Get some food, a little booze, a little fun? We haven't been to town in awhile. There have to be at least a few suckers begging for me to take them off their coin. What do you say?"

"I say you get me out of the house, but a walk sounds nice for now," counter-offered Al. "It's supposed to be a nice night. I want air, not smoke and guys grabbing my ass. I gave that up the day I quit school."

"Well, I'll guarantee you the lack of smoke, but I can't promise there won't be any games of grabass," Dean winked at her. "Caleb was one of my best friends. I have a duty to make sure you're well looked after."

"Sam? You're closer. Smack him for me." When Sam actually did as requested, Al laughed. Over Dean's protests, she gloated, "Life's a bitch, man, and so am I." To Sam, she said, "Damn, kid, we missed you around here."

"Why? Because I always did everything you told me to?"

Dean rolled his eyes and groaned, "God, I miss those days."

---

They walked through a good portion of the property, talking about anything but what they were supposed to be talking about. Sam heard a few stories from his college days, the missing stories about his brother's life that Dean seemed to not want to talk about with him. They were stories about times surrounding hunts but never about hunts themselves. It was about the fun and the wind-downs and the things that made their lives worth the hard stuff.

Had Dean told Sam about the time that Caleb got him drunk on vodka and the two of them had a two car demo derby in the back forty at three in the morning?

Who won?

Since Caleb wasn't there to defend himself at the moment, he did. Loser.

Had Dean told Sam about the time that Pastor Jim sent their chosen little family on a mandated vacation to that cabin he had up in northern Minnesota? The boys got drunk ice fishing and were throwing their picks in the ice like horseshoes. They couldn't figure out why the ice finally gave way and they fell through. The two of them had thought it was hilarious.

They were okay?

Okay enough that they ended up tug of warring over their blankets until they got back to the house.

Who won?

John. He pulled the middle of the blanket so hard that the two of them ran into each other and fell down like they were the damned Keystone cops.

Sam had missed a lot. For that, he was sorry.

They had been walking for almost two hours when Al turned so that she was walking ahead of them backwards, stared down Dean and waved her hand in front of his eyes. "You aren't saying a whole hell of a lot."

"Don't have a whole helluva lot to say at the moment," he said quietly.

Sam quickly covered for his brother, wanting to let Dean ease into things. They had known that this wasn't going to be easy, but he could tell it was getting to be a lot harder on Dean than it was on him, which, he supposed, was the way it should be. He'd left them. There was no getting around that. For a little over three years, Dean had had to depend on people who weren't him. He'd had to compensate for the loss somehow; most of that had come in the form of either Pastor Jim or Caleb. He knew that. He was willing to accept that. There were always going to be things about that time that he didn't know about, just like there would be things that Dean wouldn't ever know about. Choices had been made. That's what life was. And right now, his choice was to make this a little easier on his brother for as long as he could. He had to.

"When we pulled up, the place looked like it could use some work. Is there anything you want done around here that we can do? I don't think either of us has ever used a lawn mower in our lives, but I'm sure we could figure it out."

Al startled for a moment, quickly recovered by walking forward again, and said, "Yeah. Maybe. No. I don't know. I—I guess I haven't really thought about it. Caleb, he . . . He took care of all that stuff, you know?"

Way to be, Genius, Sam chastised himself. He was doing a real stand up job of making anyone feel better. He should take that act on the road, really.

The widow must have seen her friend's flinch because she said gently, "It's okay, Sam. I'm okay. It's going to take a lot longer than two months to get used to all of this, but it's okay. It's not like I didn't know something like this was coming the day I signed on to marrying the guy. Hunter marriages come with a limited shelf life. We got the short straw. End of story. I'll find somebody to make the scrapbook."

Speaking for all of the men, the hunters, that they had known over the years, Sam said with an aching laugh, "We should come with warning labels."

"Nah," said Al with a smile. "We'd just ignore them anyway. Did your girl know about you and the hunting and all that?"

"No."

She offered him a sweet smile, letting him know that his absence didn't mean he had been out of the club. Or the family. "For you, I bet she would have ignored it the way I did. It may not be a normal life, and it sure as hell isn't a safe one, but it's a good life. I had no idea how happy I could be until you guys came along. I never knew anyone who loved like Caleb did. It was worth it."

Out of nowhere, Dean stopped walking and said heavily, "We should have been the ones to tell you. I'm sorry we didn't get down here."

"No one should have been the ones to tell me. But I do know that you would have been here yourselves if you could have. Besides, you were a little busy. Tell me you've got a lead on where that bitch is."

Sam saw Dean cringe, most likely thinking about the same thing he was, them holding the real Meg in their arms while she used her last breaths trying to give them a chance to save their father the way they'd saved her. Ignoring the chill in his spine, he said, "She's not a problem anymore."

"And The Demon?"

"In the wind," Sam admitted. "We haven't seen it ourselves since I . . . since I shot Dad, but we think maybe Dad did. We don't know for sure. We think we know what happened, but there's no real way to know."

She didn't mean to, but Al laughed. "You shot your father? Damn, kiddo. Caleb always said the two of you were going to kill each other, but I'm pretty sure you were taught well enough to know that you weren't supposed to actually try."

"It wasn't like that," whispered Sam before he let his legs take him off well in front of them so that they would have to damn near run to catch up.

Dean took his time, letting Sam catch his breath. He watched the ground as he walked, kicking at the dried leaves along the way. "Sam's had a rough go of it lately."

"You both look like death warmed over."

"You don't know that half of it," said Dean, a cold shiver up his back making him damned near ill. Not remotely half of it. "He'll be okay. You're not really a Winchester until you've shot your own father at least once."

"Does Sam know about that?"

"Nope, and you're not going to tell him." Dean watched his brother sulk his way along the path and felt a twinge he didn't like. Sam was taking the comment about shooting their old man a little too hard. "We really should catch up with him."

Suddenly Dean noticed that Al wasn't at his side any more. He was somehow standing half way in between Sam and Al, not sure which one of them he should be going after first. Sam had finally stopped long enough to look back to them, giving him a confused look. Dean jerked his head, beckoning his brother back to him. This leg of the trip was about her, not about them. Right? When Sam joined him, they silently backtracked to where Al was standing staring off into the woods where they both knew a little clearing was. Caleb had called it his and Al's own private Inspiration Point.

"Al?"

"Joshua burned him back there. He didn't know not to." The quietness of her voice was unnatural for her. She must have heard it, too, because she snapped back quickly, raising her eyes to meet those of her friends. "You know, in case either of you wanted to go there. It's not exactly a headstone or anything, but it's not like we really need them in your line of work. It's okay, really, if you want to go back there. Joshua stayed with him to make sure everything was okay, but I'll understand if you want to be sure."

Sam looked toward the clearing as if he could actually see through the trees and gulped, almost missing the sickened sound his brother made next to him. Dean didn't say anything, but his eyes popped wide in a way that only Sam would have caught. He wasn't ready. He really wasn't ready.

Carefully Sam said, "We trust him. Joshua did the right thing."

"I'm sorry it wasn't us," said Dean quietly.

"You were busy getting yourselves nearly killed," said Al, her voice back to normal as she took in the looks on the men's faces. "There's nothing you could have done."

"Yeah, I know," said Dean like he didn't really believe that at all.

Sam didn't like the look on Al's face as she watched Dean. She'd been around this life for too long. She knew what she (and Sam) thought Dean was looking for. The look was gone as soon as it appeared, but he could guess what she was thinking. He hoped she could do for his brother what he had yet to be able to do, give him at least some sense of absolution for what had happened, even if it was something Dean only thought he needed.

"Hey? You guys both know that what happened isn't your fault, right?"

And there it was. Sam swallowed his own response—Of course we do—when he saw Dean's eyes flash up to meet hers and knew exactly what his brother was going to say. It wasn't like he hadn't heard Dean's take on the situation already. Even though hearing it once was enough, Sam was pretty sure their conversation about Dad was on a continuous loop in his brother's head. He knew Dean was going to continue to blame himself for all of this, no matter what Sam said. He knew no one would convince him otherwise, so he kept his mouth shut until he could find the right time to bring it up again. Al, however, didn't seem to have the same inhibition about smacking his brother's guilt around for a while when she fixed him with a stare that shut his trap up real fast.

"Don't you even think about arguing with me, kiddo."

Dean slipped that cold mask over his face again and countered with a hollow chuckle, "Kiddo? You're barely a year older than me."

A similarly dark look took over the woman's features as she snapped, "A girl learns a lot in that year, fuckwit, and don't you forget it. But that wasn't what I was going to say. I was going to say . . . Well, I . . . You know what? You're an idiot. Caleb is my husband. I get to blame who I want to. I blame the demon that took him. I blame the demon that ordered it to do what it did to him. I blame the sonofabitch who took your parents from you. That demon did this, Dean, not you. You better be listening to me right now, both of you. None of this is your fault. You know damned well that Caleb would kick your ass right now for even suggesting that you were in any way responsible for what happened. Because unless everything that demon does is because of something you told it to do, none of this is your fault. Caleb hunted for his own reasons. You know that. And he was grateful, every day, that your lives crossed. Don't make him out to be some blind little soldier who followed you and yours around like he didn't have a mind of his own. It's insulting. He made up his mind long before you were old enough to tell him otherwise. So knock it off. You're both idiots and I could strangle you both. You come here to my house out of some sense of what? Loyalty? Duty? Because that's what your daddy the marine taught you to do? I couldn't care less what sort of protocol or code of fucking conduct you guys think is supposed to happen here. You can't come here and expect me to listen to you sit and tell me how any of this is any of your fault. You know damned well that you never would have chosen this life—hell, you wouldn't even know that a life like this existed if it wasn't for what that thing did to your mother. So don't give me this 'we're sorry' look and expect me to be okay with it. God, you're both idiots!"

"Wait—"

Yanking her arm out of Dean's reach, again the woman snapped before her friend could try to counter anything she had to say. "Next thing I know, you're going to tell me that Pastor Jim's death is on your hands, too, huh? Do you really have so little faith in him that he couldn't handle himself without you? Even though he was the one who taught your old man everything he knew about hunting? After everything you've seen and done, I would have thought you knew better, but apparently someone needs to kick your teeth in good and hard. We are all grownups here. We made the choice to live this life. You don't get to take that away, neither of you."

Al was shaking so hard in her anger now that she became this ball of energy that neither man dared to get in front of. She started pacing back and forth not really seeing them anymore, yelling at them at the tops of her lungs in a burst of anger that they had never seen from her before. She was the calm one. She was the one who did all the stitching and calming and ordering around when any of her men were hurt. It was one of Caleb's selling points on her when she was first introduced to their sad, strange little family. This wasn't her at all.

Dean followed her with his eyes, looking for all the world like he was taking a needed punishment. Sam saw the look, and so did Al, because she took her focus back to just Dean instead of both brothers.

"Don't you look at me like that. Don't. Damn it, Dean! You are just . . . I swear, if it wouldn't mean another body to bury, I would kill you right now." She seemed to catch herself with that last bit, the reality of what she'd just said hitting her hard. If it hadn't, it still hit Sam right in the chest. They exchanged a look, knowing that the other had heard it. Her resolve snapped, she crossed her arms over her chest to try to contain her shaking. Softly she begged, "Tell me you loved him. Tell me you'll miss him. Tell me anything but that you're sorry."

Without really thinking about it, Dean did as she asked and just started talking. He kind of knew what he was thinking about saying, but he wasn't sure. He started saying the first thing that came to mind and hoped it would be the right thing. He concentrated on keeping his voice from shaking as he said, "The night we met you, he knew he wanted to marry you. We were sitting there in the corner watching you hustle six guys one after the other at the pool tables and flipping a quarter over and over to see which one of us was going to get to try to bag you first. He won. He told me he had no intention of losing the chance to me. As far as he was concerned, he had never seen anything more beautiful. That's when he went over and tried to hustle you, but you hustled him first. I don't think I've ever seen him get hustled before or since. He came back over to our table and told me right then and there that he wanted you. You got the good end of the deal. With me, you would have had a one night stand. With him, you got a husband."

Tears blurring up her eyes, Al whispered, "Shut up."

"The night you got married is one of the few times I've ever seen my dad completely relaxed. He was drunk stupid, but he was relaxed. The two of us were sitting at the table watching the two of you dance. I don't think he realized he was saying what he was thinking out loud, but he said that he could tell that Caleb had a smile that was only for you. The thing about Caleb, you could always tell what was going on with him by how he looked. And Dad was right. There was one smile that he had that he never had for anyone else. It was the only smile he had that was truly happy. You made him happy. I've seen him little kid giddy as all git out when we're in the middle of a hunt or in some hole in the wall, but I've never seen him as happy as he was when he could just look at you when he thought you weren't looking back."

Again, she said, "Shut up, Dean."

"He wanted to have kids with you. For years, he used to say that anyone who even thought about having kids in the world we live in was an idiot. If Dad's reason for hunting hadn't been Mom, Caleb said he would have beaten Dad for dragging us into it. He said he knew too much about the world to deliberately put anyone through it. But he told me once that he felt safe doing it with you. He wanted to be a dad because of you."

"Knock it off right now, Winchester, or I will kick your fucking ass."

"Dean," Sam started, only to be cut off.

"So don't tell me not to feel guilty right now," Dean said, his voice deathly quiet, vicious and angry. "In the course of one week, my father and two of my only real friends in this world were taken from me. You can call it what you want, but I have every right to be angry. I will be as angry as I damned well want to be. And I can blame myself if I want to. And I can be sorry if I want to. Because I am. I'm sorry that he isn't coming home. It may not be my fault, but I'm allowed to feel sorry. I am so fucking sorry."

"Okay."

"What?" he snapped loudly and still angry, not quite on the same page as her.

"Okay, Dean."

The softness of Al's answer nearly knocked the wind out of him. He turned away from her, swiping a hand over his face to try to regain control. He pulled in a breath and held it a good ten seconds, counting down, then let it out, turning back around. "What?"

"Okay. Be sorry if you want to. I won't stop you. I should have known better than to try."

There was an out there and Dean was not going to be dumb enough not to take it. He clenched his teeth down hard, counted to five, then replaced everything with a big old smile. Conversation over. No arguments. The smart ass was back where he shouldn't have left. The joke didn't quite hit his tone right, but it was there just the same. "Damn straight, you should. You know I always win."

"The hell you say," argued Al, fake smile of her own directed right back at them.

You're a liar.

So are you.

But I'm better at it than you.

---

Another two hours later or so, things started to get uncomfortable. Al continually glanced at the clock, at the mess of a living room that she had yet to clean up, at the two men in her kitchen. As gruesome a possibility as it was, Sam had offered to help her clean the house up. They both had seen how afraid she was of the living room in all its torn up glory. With all the blood and mess, it was a wonder she'd allowed herself to stay in the house at all.

Still, she had refused their offer, at least for the night. They would be back in the morning, they'd assured her. She was more than welcome to come up with a Honey Do list for them. They wouldn't mind.

That was okay, though. She would find a way eventually.

Walking them out the back door, around the house, then to the car, she gazed up at the stars instead of at them. A little skittish, she requested, "You guys call me when you get settled in at the motel, okay?"

"Are you sure you don't want us to stay?" asked Dean, concerned. Not that he minded if she wanted to be alone, but she looked scared, and that made a big difference in his book.

"I'm sure. I think I just need to take a bath and get some sleep. It always looks better in the morning, right?"

Sam wasn't buying it any more than Dean. For a lot of different reasons, the immediate future being one of the least scary prospects actually, he almost wished he could ask her to come with them, try to keep at least some part of their sad, strange collected little family together for a little while longer. Knowing he couldn't ask that of her or of them, he instead asked, "Are you sure you're going to be okay? Is there anything we can do for you to at least get you through the night?"

A resignation came over her face, darkening her eyes. She chewed her lower lip, contemplating her decision, before blurting, "Aw, what the hell. Can you follow me down to the basement for a minute?"

The brothers glanced at one another, shrugged, and followed her wordlessly back into the house and toward the door that would lead them to the steps down to the basement. As soon as Dean opened the door for her, he bit back a gag reflex. "Damn, what are you keeping down there?"

Under her breath, they could both hear her muttering "Damn it, damn it, damn it" as if she didn't remember they were there. Her voice came back to them much more casual and forceful. "You know what? Nevermind. I can take care of this myself."

"It's not a problem," said Dean with a shrug. "It's not like we're in a rush out the door. But if you want it to wait for morning . . ."

She didn't say anything else but took the lead down the stairs with ridiculously slow care. When they were all three at the bottom, she looked at the both of them with tears in her eyes. Her voice was shaking scarily as she nodded toward the washing machine and dryer. "There should be some salt in the coffee can and lighter fluid on the shelf there next to the Tide. Caleb had the stuff stashed all over the house in the weirdest places. I ended up salting his clothes more times than I can count."

The idea of it making Dean itch all over, he laughed, "I bet he loved that."

"It's definitely a look," she said nervously. "What can I say? I never was the domestic type. If that was what Caleb wanted, he definitely picked the wrong girl. But anyway, I've been using the tee shirts and stuff for rags. If you need some for the car, I've got a whole garbage bag full. It's right up there at the top of the stairs."

"Sure, we'll grab a few," said Dean, a little uneasily. Her sudden nervous movements weren't like her at all. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," said Al all too quickly. "Listen, it's late. You guys really should get on the road. You can stay if you want, obviously, but not down here. I'm sure I can get my dad to take care of this for me. It's no big deal. Why don't we go back upstairs?"

Dean's expression darkened, concerned. He reached for his friend's widow, intending to gently pull her back into the light so that he could see for himself what was wrong with her, but she stepped back even further into the shadows away from them both. "Al?"

"Out of here, guys, let's go."

"Alice."

"Nope. I mean it, let's go. I'll take care of this myself."

"Al—"

"I said no!" Al snapped, but the order was drowned out by the sound of a rather loud crash over the bottom of the stairs.

Sam immediately stepped in front of their friend, eyes popping open to try to get a better look into the darkness for a sign of whatever it was that had fallen. In the meantime, Dean looked up into the rafters, searching, and asked, "Where's Minion? She still like to climb up there?"

"It wasn't Minion," said Al with a hard quietness that urged both men to turn to look at her. "That was me."

Dean eyed her suspiciously. "What was you?"

The woman's voice sounded even smaller in the dark, scaring the bejesus out of all three of them. Rushing her words to get them out before they could get stuck, she said, "I had a fight with my mother after Caleb called to tell me about Pastor Jim. She never knew what Caleb really did, but she didn't trust him either. She was terrified of him, believe it or not. She was convinced he was going to go all Unabomber on us one day. She didn't trust anything about him. She thought that the people who came and went from this place were scary. Of course, the only two she ever saw were your dad and Joshua, but she got this bug up her ass about it and never let up. She thought John was especially scary, seeing as how she always saw Dean sitting in the car but never coming out of it. She didn't trust any of you. She was trying to convince me that I still had a chance to get out of our marriage since there weren't any kids yet. I didn't want to fight with her again. It's been ten damn years of that fight. So I left. I . . . I wasn't supposed to come home for another week, but after Caleb told me about Jim, I didn't want to be alone. I had to get out of there. I just drove and ended up here. She was waiting in the living room for him when I got here."

Sam was positively sick when he whispered, "Meg."

"Bleached psycho with a billboard sized flair for drama?" asked Al.

"That's her," said Sam without any hint of humor. Regretfully, he reached out for his friend's hand, but she quickly pulled away. "Al—"

The rest of her shook for the first time while she stared off into the darkness, seeing something that Sam guessed was locked now only in her memory. "We always joked that if the apocalypse came, this was the safest place in the world to be. We have an arsenal big enough to hold off an army and enough food and water to get us all through at least a year. That's always been the joke . . . He didn't tell me not to come home. All he said was that Pastor Jim was dead, that you and your dad were on its tail, and that he would call as soon as it was safe. He didn't tell me it wasn't safe to come home. We always said the safest place was home."

The implications of what the two of them were saying slowly sucker punched Dean in the gut. He could feel the liquid panic spreading through his mind, screaming at him to run away from what it was that they were saying. He didn't want to be right; dear God, don't let him be right. He spared a glance at his brother, who happened to look up at the same time. He saw the same sickness blearing out Sam's great big eyes. Fuck. Fuckfuckfuck. He secretly was grateful that she wasn't looking at him. He wouldn't have been able to take it. Stop the madness, his head screamed. Stop it now, before you have to hear any more. Stop it before either of them tries to make any of this any more obvious. Thickly he asked, "Where?"

Staring back at the same spot she had been before, she pointed a nail-bitten finger into nothingness.

Instantly Dean remembered the large walk-in freezer that Caleb had installed down there for stashing some of his more unorthodox weapons, things that only the hunters he supplied would need, things that would have him labeled a Dahmer-like freak should they ever be discovered. His lower jaw worked back and forth as he tried to find the right way to ask his next question. "Tell me the damned thing is still working."

"It's a regular penguin habitat," she assured him.

He didn't know how to cover the mixture of weakness and complete fury in his voice as he coughed, "Stay here, okay?" Meeting the protesting look he knew he was going to be getting from Sam before he even got that far, Dean ordered, "Stay with her, Sam."

"Dean, don't," Al pleaded, barely a whisper.

"I swear to God, don't you even think about saying another word or I'll—Just stay there and keep quiet."

Never one for orders, she said again, "He didn't tell me not to come home."

Unable to look at her then, Dean disappeared into the shadows, grabbing the flashlight from next to the fuse box where it always was on the way. The only indication to Sam and Al that he knew where he was going was the ominously loud snick of the door handle being pulled back and the whoosh of frozen air that swept into their faces.

Dean was cold and it had nothing to do with the temperature. Part of him had hoped to find her right as he'd walked in the door so that he could still feel the relative warmth from the rest of the basement coming through the door. He'd hoped to find her right away so that he wouldn't have to search out the entire damned thing. The implications of what that would mean were a little much. No such luck. But then, having one of his best friend's widows thrown away like an unwanted popsicle was not exactly going to fall into the category of 'Luck' anyway.

The sweep of the flashlight barely called his attention to her when he finally found her flung into the farthest back corner behind some of the racks Caleb had built for storage. The only thing Meg could have done more to keep them from ever finding her was to dump her in the lake or something. If Al hadn't given them at least some indication, she never would have been found.

As it was, she was propped up, a shoulder braced on each of the joining corners. Her legs were splayed out in front of her, slightly bent at the knees by muscles that were only up because they were frozen that way. Her arms lay uselessly at her side, looking more like they belonged on a much-abused toddler's doll rather than a human being. He squatted down in front of her at near-eye level. One of the eyes was pretty much blown out by what was most likely Meg's minimal effort to strangle their friend. The blackness around her neck was enough to make his own throat constrict with pain. There was no look of repose or sleep, not like they tell you it's supposed to be.

There was no warning even for him as Dean grabbed at the shelving on his right side and yanked as hard as he could. When it didn't budge, he turned and gripped the vertical support with both hands and just pulled. Still standing, he started to snake off whatever he could from the shelves. He threw things in every which direction, kicking at the glass remnants and steel frame and everything he could reach. He growled low in his throat, unable to form the scream he knew needed to come out. He wasn't going to let them hear him scream. He wasn't going to give Meg the satisfaction, either. He doubted she could hear him all the way down there, but he wasn't going to give it to her anyway. Kick after kick, punch after punch into the frozen steel, he beat at everything until his knuckles bled. It was only when he was able to start forming thoughts again that he slowed down. Eventually he sank to the floor, too tired to do anything but stare right back at his dead friend in some twisted version of a staring war.

Back out in the basement, Sam had turned the lights on over where Caleb's desk had been. Well, still was. It was the ownership that had changed. Unlike Pastor Jim's sanctuary, however, nothing had been done to clean up after . . . after. It wasn't like Al could have done it, not really. Joshua had probably wanted to get out of there as fast as possible, both for fear of his own life and for the sheer horror of it. Sam knew that the smell of the blood that had turned black on the floor was the smell that had accosted them coming down the stairs. He couldn't imagine what it had been like to live with that for the last two months.

Al was staring at the ring almost as if she could see Caleb sitting there in the middle of it. Sam immediately knew he had to get her away from it, although he guessed that would be a lot harder than it should be.

"What do you think's going on in there?" muttered Sam, tapping his cast nervously against his thigh, a nervous habit he had quickly developed once the damned thing came on. "He's taking too long. If I turn the lights off again, will you be okay? I don't want to leave you here like this, but I don't want him seeing that when we come back out either. I don't know that you should be down here right now anyway."

Alice stepped out in front of Sam to keep him back, sad smile in every inch of her body. "I'll go." When Sam opened his mouth to protest, that He's my brother look all over his face, she said pointedly, "Suck it up, Winchester. It's my corpse. I get to go." Just to settle the discussion, she blinked out of the room as if she hadn't been there at all.

When she found Dean, he was sitting on the wall opposite where her body was sitting, staring just as sightlessly as her corpse. His forearms rested on his knees, hands dangling hopelessly. The flashlight was between his feet, shedding only enough light to reflect on her body up to her chin or so. From the look in Dean's eyes, it was probably enough. Al sat down next to him cross-legged, hands squeezing tightly in her lap. "So what's the verdict, Doc? Time to cut off life support?"

"Not funny," said Dean with barely a whisper.

"I think frostbite is going to be a good look for me. It's not like I wasn't pale enough that I look blue in most light already, right?"

"Stop."

"I told her she couldn't kill me because I was already contracted for the sequel, but she said she was going to demand a rewrite."

"Al."

"Laugh, Dean. This is too morbid otherwise."

"You were going to let us walk out the door and leave you here," he said. Suddenly it became very obvious that his lack of a voice wasn't one of sadness or grief. It was one of complete anger, anger directed right at her. "Why? So we could come back in twenty years after you've managed to sink so low into the crazies that you end up just like the rest of them? You know what we do; you know what we hunt. You've seen what happens to spirits when they—God, Al, you were going to have us fucking leave you here!"

The woman—or rather, her spirit, he told himself—stared at him patiently, waiting for him to get out whatever it was he was going to say. She looked like she didn't think he was done yet, so he supposed it looked like he wasn't. He didn't feel like he was. Her staring at him only made it boil over more, and despite the fact that he was sitting in a frozen cooler with the corpse of his best friend's wife, he felt hot all over.

"When Joshua was here to tell you about Caleb, did you try to tell him?"

"No."

"Why? Because you knew we'd be around to do the dirty work eventually? Are we really that predictable?"

"It wasn't like that. When I saw Joshua, it wasn't because he was here to tell me about Caleb. He was here to . . . to take care of him. I doubt I was even remotely on his mind at all. He couldn't see me. I could see him, but he couldn't see me. If he felt that I was here at all, he must have assumed that I was Caleb and that he'd be gone once he finished the usuals. When I realized he didn't know I was here, I tried to figure out how to get his attention, I did, but nothing worked. Caleb and I had talked to him just a few days before, so he must have assumed I was at my mother's still. He was on the phone with your dad when he got here. John told him to take care of Caleb and then to worry about telling me later, just in case the demon had done anything to him. They were trying to take care of Caleb."

That answer definitely wasn't good enough, not for Dean. He was too angry with her to let it be. "And the last couple of hours? You had plenty time to tell Sam and me. How could you let us think that there was nothing wrong? What the hell were you thinking?"

"I've been trying to do it myself," she said painfully, looking at her body for the first time since coming into the cooler. "I thought if I could find a way to Topper myself around, I'd be okay. But apparently that's against the rules or something because I've tried. God help me, Dean, I've tried, but I can't even strike a damn match, let alone drag my frozen ass out to the woods. I can't seem to touch anything. I can rattle things around when I'm upset, but that's about it."

"That banging in the rafters was you, like you said?"

She nodded. "I didn't mean to. You are just too damned stubborn to listen. It happens when I get frustrated, and let's face it, kid, you always did know how to bring out the frustration in all of us on an occasion or two."

That was definitely the wrong thing for her to say, because just as Dean was weirded out enough to remember that she was his friend, too, and that he should be trying to figure this bitch out instead of being mad at her, he heard that and got hot all over again. Angrily, he said, "Of course I'm fucking frustrated! You know why? Because you're becoming one of them! Damn it, Al! How the hell do you think these things happen? Huh?"

Defensively, she said, "I'm not a child, so stop talking to me like I am one. I know what happens, but what was I supposed to do? Damned if I do, damned if I don't. I thought that if I let you two walk out the door today thinking that I was going to pack up, you'd just assume that I did. If you thought I'd gone off the grid completely, you wouldn't worry about it. But then I realized that you'd be back, because that's who you two are. Even if it was only once a year, you'd still check in out of loyalty to your dad or Caleb, whoever. Eventually you would have figured it out. And maybe, if I was lucky enough, it would be after I had managed to finally figure this out. Yeah, I wanted to do it myself because I knew you'd look at me like you are right now, like I'm not even me anymore. But then, you just said it: I'm one of them now, aren't I?"

"Yeah? How? You said yourself you can't or you would have done it already."

"You know what? Get out of my house, Winchester. I don't need your pity, and I sure as hell don't need your lectures. I'm working up to it. It's only been two months. I've got time. It's exactly twenty-three feet from here to the salt can, lighter fluid, and flame thrower. Even if I can only figure out how to move them a few feet a year, I'll get them there. It's not your problem."

Dean was positively sick hearing what was obviously a lot of thought having gone in to how she was going to destroy her own remains. The catch in his throat came out all wrong, sounding furious instead of hopeless the way he was feeling. "Jesus, you—"

Al snapped back, just as angrily, unable to hold back her tears any longer. "Tell me, hot shot, in your vast experience with being dead and all, what would you have done?"

Dean had never been able to stand seeing a girl cry. He hated watching girls cry. It was something he had in common with his father that wasn't taught. He forced his tone to change in spite of his anger then, unwilling to make her cry any more. "Then why did you take us down here?"

Pointedly she said, "Because I don't want to spend the next ten years trapped in this house trying to figure out how I'm going to destroy myself. Okay? I thought I could. I want to. I don't want you to have to do it at all. Don't you think I want to? But I . . . If nothing else, I've had plenty of time to do the math here. If I do it right here in this room, it would lead to too many questions. The fire would spread, especially with the coolant chemicals in this thing. Eventually it would hit all of the ammunition in the house, maybe even get out to the shed out back. We're in the middle of nowhere, just the way we like it, and no one would see this place until every last bit of ammunition went up. This place would become a crater. Dead or alive, it would start a lot of questions about Caleb and eventually you and your Dad and the others. I stay and go crazy, I'm selfish. I blow this place up, I'm selfish. I ask you or whoever happened to come by next to help me, I'm selfish. There was no real good way out of this one. At least with you two, I'm with family." As if she could read his mind, she added, "Joshua isn't family. A friend, yes, but he was never family to us the way the three of you were."

"This has got to be the single most—FUCK!" Dean kicked his heel in to the solid floor of the freezer, banged his elbow back into the wall that propped him up, and clenched his jaws so tight he could swear he could feel his teeth buckling under the pressure. He slammed his elbow back a few more times until he was seeing stars in his vision. For her part, Al sat there patiently waiting for him to finish his explosion. When he saw her sitting there looking so calmly at him and sitting right beside her own corpse, it drained the fight out of him almost completely. This was just so damned screwed up. Needing to change his focus at least a little until he could sort it out in his head, Dean watched his hands, unable to look at her anymore, and asked, "Did Caleb know?"

"I don't know. After I saw her, everything is kind of a blur until maybe a couple of hours later. I remember sort of waking up sitting up in our bedroom looking out the window. I don't know how I got there. I didn't really have a handle on anything. I don't know how long I sat there, but it sort of all came back to me real fast. I found him in the basement here, over by where he keeps his personal weapons. I sat down here with him, just talking to him. It wasn't until Joshua came down and couldn't see me that I realized something was wrong with me. I was so worried about Caleb that it didn't even occur to me that something was wrong. Then when Joshua took him away and after that I couldn't follow, I—It's been a long two months since."

When Dean saw the look on his friend's face, he suddenly remembered that he was in fact yelling at her spirit, not at her. Whatever he was saying to her, it was going to be the last things that he was going to say to her in this world. He sure as hell wasn't going to leave her like this, not now, and it wouldn't be long before he wasn't going to be able to say anything to her at all. His anger softened then, remembering that she was his best friend's wife, someone who he had loved dearly himself. He was both apologetic and sad as he asked her then, "Are you, you know, okay?"

She seemed to actually ponder the question, like she wanted to give him a real answer, but all she came up with was a smile. "I'm dead, have no idea where my husband is, and have to watch two people I love dig me a grave tonight. I'm shiny. I want to buy the world a Coke."

Unable to really respond to that, Dean tipped his head toward the freezer door. "We should check on Sam."

"He's okay," she said quietly.

Dean glared at her, bitter, even though it wasn't necessarily directed at her. None of us are okay.

There isn't a single thing about this that's okay.

---

Dean stuck his shovel into the dirt, dark scowl on his face. He was aching already, which really had not been the plan for the day at all. In his mind, they were supposed to be knocking back a few at the bar on the other outside of town until Al was too drunk to stand. They were going to bring her home, put her to bed, and in the morning find their way to their goodbyes. They were supposed to be toasting Caleb and Jim and their father, all three of them drowning their grief uselessly in beer and tequila because that was how they had all grown accustomed to doing it. Years of hunting had turned them all that way. But that wasn't what they were doing. It wasn't even close.

Three feet down in the ground now, Dean grumbled all too loudly, "This is ten different kinds of fucked up, you know that?"

"How? You dig a grave up at least once every other week in a bad month," Al pointed out from her perch on the boulder that was to be her headstone.

"Yeah, well, Casper isn't usually sitting right there watching me do it."

"DEAN!" snapped Sam.

"Don't get all bashful on me now, cowboy," said Al, excusing the comment with a bright smile that Dean almost remembered seeing on her face before. No ghostly smile could ever be as honest as the ones she used to have, especially when she thought Caleb wasn't looking. Even in these last few hours, Dean knew he wasn't going to be seeing that smile ever again, before or after. Still, she was trying her damnedest, that's for sure. "I've seen you in much more compromising positions than this."

Forgetting for the briefest of moments that his friend was dead and not just sitting there having a normal conversation with them, Sam blurted, "You have?"

Al smiled again, defiant, as Dean shot her a warning look. To Sam, she happily relayed, "One night, probably three years ago or so, your knucklehead brother swings by with your dad completely torn to hell. When they finally got him cleaned up and knocked out for the night, the two of them leave me alone with him so that they can go get trashed over at the Bend in the Road. I could have killed them. They had the sense to call me and not drive home, which I was grateful for, until I get there. They wanted ice cream. They wanted ice cream and they wanted it badly. They managed to get us kicked out of Betty Jean's after they proceeded to whoop and holler and start flinging it at each other like they were all of three years old. I'm the one that got stuck putting them to bed and washing the sheets the next morning. I just threw out their clothes. Sam, honey? No matter what your brother tries to tell you, he should never, ever, under any circumstances drink vodka ever again. Got it?"

"It wasn't that bad," said Dean.

"Want me to have Sam hit you over the head with the shovel so you can remember what it felt like the next morning?"

"It wasn't that bad," he said again, grunting as he slammed the head of the shovel into the dirt. "Ignoring you now."

"Go ahead. I was talking to Sam anyway. Anyhoo, I thought your dad was going to knock their heads together until they were out cold when he saw them the next morning. I swear, your brother looked a lot worse off than your dad, and John at least had an excuse." Al's face twitched with sadness, but she gave her next sentiment the most casual tone she could. "You really missed out on some fun stuff around here, kid. We saw the two of them so often after you left that I bet your dad didn't spend more than thirty bucks on laundry in the entire time you were gone. Which, come to think of it, that's probably why they were here. Hotel maid service doesn't include laundry the way this place does, I suppose. There's probably some stuff upstairs yet in the closet for what was going to be the nursery, if you go check before you guys leave, by the way. It's your stuff. You might as well have it."

"Right," said Sam softly. He hated how every few minutes something one of them said sounded like Goodbye.

From just under the level ground, Sam saw Dean's eyes peeking over looking for his. He'd heard it, too.

Half an hour later, Dean climbed out of the grave with a hand from his brother. Sam handed him a bottle of water, which he shook off. He needed to be drinking something, but water wasn't exactly it. He breathed heavily for a moment, staring down into that deep fucking hole and wasn't entirely sure he didn't want to climb in there himself. Feeling like he had to get out of there, fast, he gave his brother a look and said, "I'll be back."

"I'll help," Sam said quietly.

"I've got it." Dean wanted to do this alone. There was no reason to traumatize them both with having to go into that freezer and haul that once loved frozen corpse out and have to . . . He gave a pointed look at Sam's cast, though, just to make that the reason. That was a reason Sam would accept a lot better. "I'm going to need you to drive as it is."

"You sure?"

Dean's voice was stone cold as he told them, "I'll be back."

Al looked up at the sky, unable to watch Dean stalk off. It was getting to be that time, and she didn't have much more time to give them. Without looking directly at him she told Sam, "I want you guys to clean out the safe. Caleb's stash is in there. It should set you up for a couple months. You don't have to use it right away. Save it for an emergency or something if you want. I'd just feel better if I knew you were at least sort of taken care of. Have Bobby haul our cars and you can sell them off. The paperwork should be in the safe. We don't need it, and I'd rather that it go to help you guys out than have my parents auction stuff off to someone who isn't going to give a damn. It's the least we can do to take care of you guys one more time."

Sam wasn't sure if this was the right way to put it, but he smiled at her anyway, trying to say his 'thank yous' in a way that would keep either of them from getting too close to tears. God, this trip sucked. "I'm really going to miss this place."

"We had fun," she agreed. "Emergency amateur kitchen table surgeries and the occasional bullet wound aside, we had a good time. Whatever anyone on the outside thinks, we made a life. No regrets." When Sam only nodded at her, she asked, "He's going to hate me for a long time, isn't he?"

"He'll get over it," Sam said quickly. The last thing he wanted to do was send one of their own off to the unknown thinking either of them was going to curse her along the way. "Ever since Dad died, things have been . . . He'll get over it."

"You two take care of each other," she said with a crooked smile. "That's an order."

"Always do."

They both drifted off into a strangely comfortable silence, staring up at the clear, cold night. It had been awhile since Sam had taken the time to look up at the stars and notice them for something other than whether or not they were aligned against him. He hadn't wanted to. He had had plenty of time to look up at the stars sitting in the Impala, waiting to find out if help would come for his father and brother. He'd decided then and there that he didn't want to see them anymore. Maybe now they weren't so bad, though.

"You should go help Dean," said Al, invading his thoughts.

Sam squinched his face up a little. "He said not to."

"Well, I'm telling you to go. This small talk thing is killing me here."

"Hardy har har."

"You keep pouting like that, one of these days your face is going to stay that way."

Sam reached out to shove her playfully only to have his hands go right through her. He stared at them, still not quite comprehending what they were doing out there. She looked so solid, so alive. It was only when she came into contact with things that she wasn't. It was so wrong. So very wrong.

"Go help Dean, Sam."

"You'll be okay?"

"Go."

"Stay" came the command from about twenty feet away. Dean came through the trees, carrying her across his chest with a heavy afghan covering her. When he caught up to them, he laid her body gently on the grass, making sure to cover her entirely with the blanket. He'd tried to close her eyes, but he'd been unable to manipulate her frozen flesh. He was lucky he had been able to find a way to carry her at all.

He stood there, hands on his knees trying to catch his breath. That walk up the stairs, through the house, and through the woods to the clearing had been a lot longer than he'd thought it would be. After a moment, he gave his brother a look, and together they quickly lowered their friend's body into the ground without any words of any kind. The idea of talking just wasn't coming to either of them at the moment. They both knew what the other was thinking anyway.

They had done this too many times lately. Far too many times.

When her body lay covered at the bottom of the hole, the two men climbed out and sat on either side of her for a while, all three of them looking up at the stars. It was probably a good ten minutes before Dean asked gruffly, "You ready?"

Al gave her friends an anemic grin, which Dean added to the list of ones she'd never smile at him as beautifully as she used to. Crookedly, she said, "I'd hug you, but I know how you Winchesters are about the whole hugging thing. Well, that and the whole lack of actual corporeality thing. So far? Being a ghost sucks."

"Maybe the next stop will be better," said Sam half-cheerfully. "You never know."

"Well, if nothing else, as long as Caleb's there, too, it's going to be an adventure. I could do with a little adventure these days. And a drink. All I can say is that the bar better be stocked because I intend to have a good time. My boy owes me a night out after all this."

Sam winked at her. "Good luck with that."

Dean plastered the widest grin on his face that he could manage under the circumstances. "Tell that ugly sonofabitch he owes me a pitcher when I get there."

"We'll be waiting," she said. "Just not too soon, okay? I had to share him with all of you for too long. I want him to myself for a while. We'll have plenty of time to catch up with you kids later." She took a heavy breath, looked up at the stars overhead, and snapped her fingers on her right hand. "All right, guys. Light 'em up!"

With matching grins of encouragement, Sam and Dean lit their matches with one synchronized movement and dropped the flames into the grave. They watched her, careful not to see which match hit the body first. Neither of them wanted to know whose flame started the job. They just wanted to be there to see the job finished. Alice's spirit glowed in the flames before it quickly dissipated off into the air like the ash off a camp fire. Dean could have sworn that the ashes looked happy as they flew off into the night, heading toward the stars and God knows what else.

God, he missed her already. Caleb, too. And Jim, he missed him even more. And Dad, well . . . Excepting Sam, everyone he'd ever really let himself love was gone now. He missed them all so much it physically hurt.

They stood there for a moment watching the sparks until finally Dean said, "Go back to the house, Sam."

"Why?"

"Just go. I'll be there in a little while."

"You sure?"

"Go, Sammy."

Sam didn't argue any more than that. Standing there and pushing the point over the still-burning corpse of a good, loyal friend didn't exactly seem like a good way to honor her and her sacrifice. That was what this whole trip had been about, right? Honoring the fallen? So why did it feel so lousy?

Dean stayed to make sure the flames died out without catching anything around the grave on fire. Al had been right, after all. The last thing any of them needed was unnecessary attention directed at this old farm. Best to keep it within the right circles. The two of them would get rid of as much of Caleb's stock pile as possible, but their trunk was only going to hold so much. He could call up certain interested parties, sure, but that would still leave too much to be discovered. It wouldn't be too long, he hoped, before her mother started looking around for her daughter, but he wasn't holding his breath on that one either. But even if her mother didn't come looking, someone would. It wasn't as if the only people the couple had known were hunters. People would come looking, right?

The blackness of the unspoken answer to that question sucked him in, as if it was all that hard to do these days. He wondered, feeling goosebumps raise on his arms and back, what would happen to them one day. Their numbers were dwindling. There was no getting around that. Their entire lives, their father had kept them away from other hunters. That a place like Ellen's existed hadn't even occurred to him. They had been their own underground. Just them, Caleb and later Al, Pastor Jim, Joshua, and Jefferson. Sometimes Bobby, when he wasn't threatening to beat Dad all through the Badlands if he didn't shut his yap. It was a small, intimate little group, a family that they had patchworked together for themselves, Pastor Jim leading the way. They didn't have the luxury of knowing anyone else. It was what worked for them, how they survived. And yet, those goosebumps shook him again, making him wonder exactly what would have happened to Al if it hadn't been for them stopping by. What if they hadn't made it out of the crash? Bobby, Joshua, and Jefferson were all that would have been left, none of them knowing to check in on her the way they had. People would have come looking for her eventually. They would have known . . . Right?

People would come to look for him eventually. If it all kept going this way, someone would come looking for him and Sam, right?

Needing to do something, he started to shovel the dirt back into place, burying his friend's ashes just to be safe. People would come looking eventually. People would want to know where she was. They had. Someone else would.

The morbidity of it all started to creep back up on him, making him want to scream. He could see her as she was the first night he and Caleb had met her. She'd been so . . . Well, Caleb thought she was stunning. That was the part that mattered. Caleb had had the luxury of seeing her like that. He had a full ten years on Dean. He could be in love instead of lust. He was the lucky one. Knowing how much fun the two of them had had together, how happy they'd been, it was definitely them that had been the lucky ones.

Yes, it's Al. Daddy wanted a boy, he got a stripper. She'd said it so bluntly that it just made sense.

It wasn't like they were going to hold that against her.

She'd pretended not to know how to shoot a shotgun just so that she could have Caleb there to hold her and teach her how to do it. Dean had heard the sex had been particularly good that day.

Her first hunt, she'd beat Sam to the shot. (They'd all beat Sam at every shot, but who was counting?) She'd proceeded to drink all but John under the table. Fourteen year old Sam had had to pick them up and drive them all home. She'd kissed them all Good Night. Ten minutes later, Sam had been pounding on the wall, which had only made Al scream louder. She was a screamer when the Winchesters were around. It drove Sam crazy. That was the fun part.

Dean always remembered to bring his headphones. Sam didn't. His mistake.

The first trip to Lincoln after Sam and Dad's blowout, she'd taken him for a drive while Dad and Caleb drank their little hearts out. When she'd parked the car by the lake, she had drawn a two foot piece of plumbing pipe from the trunk, handed it over, and told him to go at it. She'd climbed back into the car, turned up the music loud enough that she couldn't hear a sound outside, and gone to sleep until he'd come back from demolishing what remained of the old boat she'd been planning to get rid of anyway. She hadn't said a word and he'd been a little less angry.

She'd stitched him up a couple of times, always kindly berating his stupidity the entire time. Dad had always agreed. Caleb had tried to back her off, only to be backed off himself with one look. She was most definitely in charge of this outfit, and if any of them didn't like it, tough shit. She was far from perfect and had screwed up just as much as she'd done right, but the right stuff was a lot easier to want to remember at the moment. He'd be mad at her for everything else later.

God, he was going to miss her. He missed them all so much.

Losing Dad might have been a little easier—yeah, fucking right—if it hadn't been for losing them all at the same time. They were pieces of Dad as much as he had been pieces of them. This was their family. This was all they had. They didn't have a home, they didn't have any stability other than each other. The proverbial rug was gone, swept out, and burned to ashes like everything and everyone else in his life now.

He probably shouldn't be thinking about it like that. He had Sam. For all of their issues and insanity lately, he had Sam. He still had Sammy. He had Bobby. One day they might have Ellen and Jo back. All of that counted for something.

People would come looking.

---

When Dean finally trudged back into the house, he was surprised to find that Sam hadn't bothered to turn any lights on. They were out in the middle of nowhere. It wasn't like they had to be that careful. Maybe the lights hadn't been on for a few months as far as passersby were concerned, but if they actually noticed a light on, he doubted they would be concerned. If they hadn't been concerned at the empty of the house for two months, they shouldn't care any more about there being anyone there either. People should mind their own damned business anyway.

"Sam?"

The darkness didn't bother to answer back and neither did Sam.

Now just plain annoyed, Dean stomped through the more obvious places in the house, starting with the basement and Caleb's desk. He checked their bedroom, the guest room, everything. The last room was the living room. It was horrifying enough in the daylight. The shadows from the light coming in the windows could only make it look worse.

Caleb had put up one helluva fight. Atta boy.

Vaya con dios, buddyboy. You better be making your girl scream right about now. No need to thank me. You kids have fun now.

Up against the wall, directly under Caleb and Alice's wedding portrait, Sam sat with his knees drawn up to his chest and a bottle of Jack next to his good hand. Dean would have tripped over his brother's feet if the light hadn't hit him just right and in enough time to warn him. Missing seeing the bottle at first, Dean looked down angrily at his brother. "You suddenly gone deaf?"

When Sam didn't say anything back, Dean tapped his brother's knee with the toe of his boot. Sam swiped at it lazily but still didn't say anything.

"Sam!"

At that, the younger brother looked up with a tear-streaked face. He didn't say anything, but he held up his bottle to his brother, inviting him to join in the misery provided he didn't try to interrupt with talk. He wasn't in the mood to talk and wasn't in the mood for people who wanted to talk either. That was the condition; take it or leave it.

Accepting the invite, Dean slumped down next to his brother, leaving them shoulder to shoulder. After having realized that he'd gone almost an entire afternoon with his friend's widow without touching her, he needed to feel that his brother was there and solid. He should have known she'd been avoiding touching them for a reason. He should have known a lot of things. And right now, he was thinking that he should have known better than to send Sam back to the house alone with no company but his thoughts. The kid knew where Caleb hid the booze just as well as anyone else who had been sewn up in that household. He had been out there too long.

After a good long while Dean asked, "Why are we sitting here in the dark?"

"No talking," Sam slurred slightly. "Just drinking."

"Okay."

A while later—Dean wasn't sure how long since he refused to look at the clock knowing that there was blood splatter on it—Sam's head started bobbing up and down at fairly regular intervals. Dean didn't necessarily want to break the 'No Talking Just Drinking' rule since it had sort of worked out for him, but he couldn't let Sam fall asleep there either. For one thing, he didn't want to deal with the crick he'd have in the neck the next morning from sitting up with the kid all night long like that. He didn't know if it was the alcohol or the sleep not-talking at the moment either. It wasn't like Sam had busted a beer from the fridge. He was drinking straight from the bottle, and Sam and Jack had never gotten along that well to begin with.

Wallowing Weapon of Choice: Jack Daniel's at a murder scene. Not pretty. Many brain cells were killed. No memories suffered permanent damage. Somehow, they never do, sly bastards.

"Hey, kiddo. Wake up."

"I'm awake."

"You're nodding. I don't think I should drive, so we're bunking down here for the night. I'll get you upstairs to your room."

"Don't wanna."

Dean ignored the whine in his own voice as he said tiredly, "Please? It's been a really lousy day. I don't want to fight. Just help me drag your happy ass upstairs."

He reached over to take the bottle from his brother's hand, but Sam was still surprisingly quick for being half dead drunk. He snatched the bottle and swept it over to the other side of his body like he was playing Keep Away. Sam snickered like a little kid, wanting to lord it over his big dope of a brother that he was much taller and would win that game, hands down. Always did. Because Dean is a little dope not a big dope and needed a frickin' step stool to keep up with him.

"Fine," grumped Dean, settling himself back into position along the wall at his brother's side. For now.

The silence that ate up the next few minutes was something they could both feel, not necessarily hear. It made the room darker. The shadows creeping up along the walls from the trees as the wind blew didn't help.

Then out of nowhere, Sam thoughtfully asked, "Have you noticed how everyone seems to want to tell us that nothing is our responsibility these days?"

"Yeah, and it's damned irritating," grumbled Dean. If only you knew, kiddo, if only you knew . . . "Why?"

"I don't know," the younger brother shrugged, obviously not meaning it to be as casual as it looked. "I guess I just wish people would stop telling me nothing is my fault."

Immediately Dean knew Sam was drunker than he'd thought and that he'd left his brother alone in the house for too long. He should have known better. Yeah, he'd needed some time to himself, time to figure out how to deal with the weight of the day, but it shouldn't have been so heavy on his mind that he didn't realize that his brother was in just as bad a place as him. He mentally kicked himself, annoyed. He'd been leaving Sam to do a lot of grieving on his own over the last two months; this trip was, among other things, supposed to be about them finally getting to grieve together so that they could put it behind them and find a way to move on. That week had torn them both up, not just him. But hearing that sickness in Sam's voice, the one that sounded so like it had the day their father had told them what he knew about The Demon, it wasn't right. He had to shut that one down quick. Forcefully, he said balls out, "Nothing is your fault."

"That's not what Dad thought."

"What?"

Sam's eyes dropped down, fascinated with how the bottle's label moved depending on how he shut one eye or the other. Deathly quiet, he muttered, "He was right. If I had just done what he'd told me to do, if I had just obeyed that one goddamn order, you wouldn't have ended up almost dying. Hell, you were dead. I saw it. I stood there in that doorway and watched you die. You said you think it's your fault that Dad's gone, like you think he died to save you—maybe he did, I don't know—but even if that part of it is true, he did it because I messed up. You both died because I screwed up. And yeah, if I had done things the way he wanted—fucking sonofabitch always had to be right—he'd still be gone, but you wouldn't be guilting yourself at every single mention of him. You'd have at least some peace of mind. I'd have . . . I'd be able to wake up at least one morning and not think that I'm the reason you're ticked off at the world and me and Dad and everyone else who comes along."

"Sam—"

"He told me what to do. He gave me the order. Either way you look at it, Dad is dead because of me."

The pity that Dean wanted to have for his brother came out much more belligerent than he meant it to. "You're an idiot, you know that?"

"I know you are, but what am I?"

"Sam."

Sam drunkenly swooped his casted hand across his chest—it was easier to see in the dark—and waved it around first in a cockeyed vertical then a wobbly horizontal, attempting to make a sign of the cross. "I absolve you of all responsibility, my son."

Rather than slug his brother, which he so very much wanted to do at the moment, Dean grabbed the bottle of Jack and whipped it across the room into the door.

"I'm not cleaning that up," said Sam with an Uh-oh, Now You've Done It voice even as he produced a second bottle from behind his back. He'd been two-fisting. Fan-fucking-tastic.

"I'm not talking about this with you when you're drunk," countered Dean. Following his brother's line of thought when he was drunk was even more of a challenge than when the guy was sober.

"You think I feel any better about it when I'm sober? This . . . heh . . . Guilt goes down a lot better when I'm not wanting to puke my guts up because everything reminds me that I screwed up. This way I at least have a few minutes of quiet before I barf."

"You did not screw up. If anything, I did because I asked you not to shoot him. I knew you'd listen to me over him. I told you not to do it."

"No, not that," Sam corrected him, sliding down off the wall to lay on his side on the floor. He could see the dust bunnies under the couch. Heh. They'd been busy little bunnies. Nymphos. "Before."

"Before what?"

"Before Pastor Jim."

Dean crawled around on hands and knees until he could see his brother's eyes again. They were more fascinated with something under the sofa than they were with the conversation, but the rest of Sam was very much tense and shaking. Not that Dean blamed him. He was pretty much shaking himself at this point. They were really going to do this, half drunk in the middle of the room that had taken two of their friends away from them for the rest of their lives. It was morbid and yet . . . "What do you mean?"

"When we first left Colorado and Dad asked me to ride with him," said Sam smally, like it hurt to admit it. "I mean really, everything changed the minute Dad told us about Pastor Jim. We didn't talk about anything else but The Demon from that moment on until he died. My last real chance at a conversation with my father, I couldn't think of anything to say to him. He asked me about Jess, which, hey, bad topic. He asked me about you, which, hey, bad topic. He asked about school, which, hey, bad topic. I couldn't talk to him about my life. I couldn't talk to him about anything. It was like being in a car with a stranger. That's why he had me get back in the car with you. He couldn't stand to be around me anymore."

Aw, shit, Sammy.

"Not that I blame him. I just wish it could have been different, especially after . . . "

"After?"

"The hotel," Sam whispered as if it were a dirty word. "I didn't mean to see him, I didn't. But I couldn't take you being worried over me like I'm six years old when he was sitting right there. He already thought I was helpless to begin with; I didn't need him thinking I couldn't handle it on my own."

It didn't happen often, but Dean was pretty sure his heart broke right then and there. It had taken a moment to follow his brother's inebriated line of thinking, but he remembered all too well now what it was that Sam meant. When his brother had come stumbling into the hotel room looking like a drunken fool, he'd known exactly what was wrong. Dad had tried to help, but Dean had backed him away with nothing more than a look.

Dean . . . Vision.

In the chair, Sam, now, before you fall down.

Hurts . . . God, it hurts.

I know. I'm right here. We'll ride it out, just like we have all the others. Breathe, Sam.

The baby . . .

Let's get you able to sit up straight before we worry about it, okay? We've got a little time.

Don't tell Dad. Please don't tell Dad.

Too late on that one, kiddo. Told you you shouldn't have skipped class the day they taught Lying To Your Father And Other Useful Avoidance Tactics.

Fuck . . . hurts.

He'd seen the look, too. Damn. Dean had thought he was the only one who had seen it. It had been quick but scary, at least for Dean. Their father had heard 'vision' and 'Don't tell Dad' and had pretty much shut himself off from them. They were going to be giving him an explanation down to the last damned detail, you'd better believe it, and they had better not leave a goddamned thing out. Dad had gone dangerous. He just thought he'd been sheltering Sam from his father's sight well enough to keep him from seeing that look, too. Damn.

"He looked at me like I'm something we hunt, Dean."

"Sam—"

"If I hadn't messed things up when I was riding with him, maybe I wouldn't care so much about that look. I could have laughed with him. I could have said all kinds of things. I was so worried about you when you were dying that I don't remember half the shit I said to him in the hospital. I remember yelling at him for wanting the stuff to summon The Demon, but really? Otherwise? My last memory of my father is him telling me to shoot him and then looking like I was a complete failure when I didn't. So what kind of son does that make me, huh? You want to feel guilty and tell me that this is all your fault? You aren't the one who didn't do as you were told and pull the trigger a second time. And what kind of fucked up universe do we live in that I have to feel guilty about not killing my father like he told me to? I don't . . . You aren't the one who disobeyed a direct order. My responsibility, not yours."

Dean sat up and crossed his legs under him Indian style, resting his elbows on his knees and letting his hands flop lazily in front of him. He tried to find the right words, but none of them really came to him. All he could hear himself saying was that his brother was a damned fool of a moron for thinking that their father loved him any less. Sam was everyone's favorite. Hell, even demons seemed to know it, which naturally scared the living daylights out of him, especially knowing what he knew, but he couldn't exactly let the cat out of the bag on that one. It was bad enough that he knew. Instead, he said the only thing that came to mind that was at least remotely consoling. "Look, the whole 'Shooting Dad' thing aside, he loved you. It was no wonder the two of you were strangers to each other. It's no one's fault, not anymore. Either one of you could have picked up the phone. Either one of you could have fallen on the sword, but you didn't. So do you know what I'm choosing to remember?"

"That you were his favorite and I'm always the screw up?"

"Shut up and I'll pretend you didn't say that. No, what I'm choosing to remember is that when I came back from that funeral home in Manning, you and Dad were laughing. I had left you alone together in a room for more than two hours, sure that I was going to come back to find you both dead after killing each other, only to open the door on the both of you laughing. You were smiling at him, and he looked happier than I'd seen him in a really long time. You guys looked like you used to, before you started fighting all the time. I almost believed for a little while that we were going to be a family again."

"You're just saying that to make me feel better."

"Is it working?"

"You're not denying it," Sam pouted. He swore the dust bunnies were copulating right in front of him. Had they no decency?

Dean tiredly pulled at his hair with the hand that wasn't busy trying to sneak his brother's bottle away from him. Yep, you've really screwed this one up, Winchester. How did he not notice the guilt he could now feel coming off his brother in waves? Oh, yeah, because he was too wrapped up in his own (not that that wasn't also entirely allowed). They both were, really. Granted, he had his reasons for not talking to his brother about it. Sam didn't know the half of it—and it was going to stay that way—but the idea that they had been this far apart for the last two months, no idea what was going on with the other . . . It was a wonder they hadn't gotten themselves killed. And that needed to end, now.

"We really are a pair sometimes, aren't we?"

"Huh?"

"It doesn't matter. Look, no more guilt. You or me."

Sam lifted his head off the floor to look at his brother with one eye screwed shut in scrutiny. "You're just saying that 'cause you think I'll believe you that you've stopped even though you won't stop and you're going to keep on feeling guilty even though I've told you like a million-gillion times that it isn't your fault. Dad loved you and died for you. You win. You're the favorite. See? The Stupid Demon was wrong. And you won't convince me otherwise. You're a liar, liar, pants on fire."

"Not the point."

"You had a point?"

"Sam, sit up and look at me." Dean waited while his brother actually did as asked and struggled to sit up. He helped situate the kid as best he could then set the bottle of Jack in between them. He made sure his brother was looking at least half way focused at him before he said, "Here's the deal. You and me, we're all we've got, especially now. And from the looks of it, I haven't been doing my job lately."

"I'm not a job, Dean," said Sam defensively. "And you're not the boss of me."

"Hey. Sober guy talking here. Shut up." An appropriately timed stuck out tongue reminded Dean of just who was in charge of this outfit. And it wasn't him, because he cracked a big old smile at that one. Stupid bitch. Heh. "Yeah, okay, fine. Have it your way."

Sam stared at Dean, looking almost sober for a moment. All silliness seemed to disappear, ball up, and well into his eyes. "You've left me alone for two months. Can you come home now please?"

"Damn it, Sam . . ."

Sam's good hand grabbed up the bottle and held it out to Dean, neck first. "I won't be mad at Dad anymore if you won't," he said in challenge. Dean took the bottle and drank in agreement. Sam took a swig of his own then held it back out. "I won't be mad at you anymore if you won't be mad at me." They each took a drink. "And really, no more being mad at Dad. He isn't here to defend himself anyway." They both took a drink.

Neither of them meant that one.

Dean took the bottle back one more time and stared at it for a while. When he looked up at Sam, he had tears in his own eyes. One more deal to make. "Tonight? Tonight we put Dad to rest with Caleb and Pastor Jim and Al. All of this shit goes away with one big, proper send-off. We drink for them and then it's done."

"You forgot Mom and Jess."

"Mom and Jess, too. Deal?"

Sam sealed the deal with a good, long chug on the bottle.

They talked about their loved ones, the good times only, and said their goodbyes in the only way they had really been taught to do it. They both laughed and cried, making the other swear never to let that one grace anyone else's ears. When Dean dumped his brother off in the bedroom upstairs, water bottle tucked into his hand, Sam was the one who got the last word in, although he was pretty much asleep as he said it.

"You know you were Dad's favorite, right?"

"Go to sleep, kiddo."

"Dean?"

"What?"

"You're my favorite, too."

---

Not as hung over as they could have been, the Brothers Winchester put a good four hundred miles between themselves and Lincoln that morning, no real destination in mind. They just went south. South sounded good. South was warm. They holed up in a motel just like all of the others that they always seemed to find. As long as it came with clean sheets, hot water, and no questions, that was all they really needed anyway.

They kept to themselves most of the day, neither really trusting himself to speak. They'd been just as quiet over dinner. Sam eventually went to sleep watching old reruns on TNT without even a simple Good Night directed his brother's way. Dean didn't really care at this point. He knew Sam would apologize in the morning anyway.

When Sam started snoring, Dean carefully got out of his bed and climbed into the shower. He turned it as hot as it would go, letting the water bite at his skin. The standard white washcloth was like sandpaper, but he didn't mind. He scrubbed hard, wishing like hell he could get the feeling off him. There was nothing specific, just a feeling of grime and gore and loss. It felt heavy on him, just like everything else. And it wouldn't fucking come off.

The water eventually ran cold, but Dean stayed under the spray until he started shivering. Because he really needed to come down with a cold right now. Because he really needed Sam to get all Mother Hen on him. He'd had enough of Big Brother Sammy lately. Kid brother needed to get back in his place here soon. He didn't like being the one being looked after. It just wasn't natural. Sam needed to get back to the natural order of things. Fast.

Once he was dressed, he found he was still very much awake. He wasn't sure why, but he had this twitchy need to make a call. He checked his watch and resigned himself to granting himself one last indulgence before he officially ended this miserable trip and started over.

Tomorrow, they'd both start over.

Making sure his brother was still asleep and still being cautious anyway, Dean stepped outside onto the balcony. He flipped his phone open and stared at it until the backlight went out, still not sure if he should do it or not. Then, before he could change his mind, he hit the speed dial and let it ring twice. Before a third ring could sound on his end, he snapped the phone shut and waited.

Half an hour's worth of pacing later, Dean was pretty much ready to give up when he felt the phone vibrate in his hand. He tried not to sound too relieved when he answered, "Hey."

"Hey, yourself. It's late. You boys okay?"

"Duty sucks," said Dean by way of answer.

"Maybe," said Ellen carefully. "But your daddy would have been proud of you for it anyway."

Asking more than one question with the one, Dean asked, "What makes you say that?"

"Your father was always proud of you boys. He just wasn't always proud of himself."

"You don't even know what we did."

Dean could hear Ellen dragging a bar stool around on her worn wooden floor and settling down. In the waiting silence, the clink of a glass hitting the bar and liquid being poured into his tantalized him. He wished to hell he'd thought to bust into the honor bar before making the call himself. After a little more jostling on her end, Ellen's voice came back and said, "You going to tell me about it?"

"You need to be liquored up to hear about it?"

"I'm always prepared. What happened?"

Ten minutes of damned near heartbreaking explanation later, Dean sighed heavily. "See? Duty sucks."

Ellen was quiet for a moment, excepting the sound of her downing the drink she had poured herself. Dean could hear her making Whiskey Face as she slammed the glass down on the bar. He heard her breathing heavily as if she were trying to pull herself together. There was a light click of her tongue before her voice came back, strong and to the point. "Why did you go on this trip, Dean?"

As if it were the most obvious answer in the world, especially since it was to him, Dean said, "Because it's what Dad would have done if it had been him to make it out of the hospital instead of me."

"But why do you think he would do it?"

"Because that's what you do. When you lose a soldier, you pay your respects."

"If that's the way he told you, I can understand that, but if that's what you think, you really didn't understand that part of him at all. It was anything but mechanics to him." She took another heavy sigh, steeled herself, then said, "I'm going to tell you something right now, but you need to understand that I cannot talk about it any more than I'm going to give you. Got it?"

Confused but curious, he quickly agreed. "Sure."

"You obviously don't remember this or you would have remembered me. It's okay. I didn't really expect you to. You couldn't have been more than ten when my Bill and your dad went off on their last hunt, but from everything your dad had told us about you kids, you were anything but ten. He told me once that you were already more of a man than he ever thought he could be. Considering the kind of standards your father held people to, I was pretty surprised. But he was so sure about you. He was so proud of you. And what I told you earlier was true. Your father was never as proud of himself as he was of you boys. It was never more obvious to me than the night after he left us. We'd . . . taken care of Bill . . . the way we all know how, you know, and John just disappeared during it. I don't know if he looked back or not. But when I was ready to take Jo back home, John was gone. Of course, I didn't notice him leave. I was . . . "

Quietly, Dean interrupted, not sure he wanted to know any more. It had been a hard enough two days as it was. "You don't have to—"

"Shut up. The important thing you need to know, the part about all of it that I am choosing to remember especially now that you boys have come into our lives . . . A week after all of this, I get a phone call. I couldn't for the life of me figure out what some little kid was doing calling my joint. We don't exactly get a lot of 'Dads' hanging out here. This place is a little rough for that. But here was this little voice on the end of my phone, calling to tell me that he was sorry. This little boy was telling me that he was sorry for the loss, and on behalf of his family, he was passing on their condolences. And then—I'll never forget it—he said he had to go because his brother's Spaghetti O's were boiling on the stove. Of all the things that happened that week, Dean, you did the one thing that I needed."

"I don't remember that. I don't . . . " Searching for any kind of memory of a phone call that could—Oh, damn! "Aw, man, I had no idea."

"Of?"

"I had never seen him like that," Dean said slowly, talking out loud as he remembered it all. "It was like he didn't even know where he was. We actually were in an apartment for the first time in probably a year. It had horrible furniture, but Sam and I were in separate beds for once. It was practically Heaven. Dad, he came home in the middle of the night, maybe three days later than he was supposed to be home, no explanations or phone calls to tell us why. He just sat down in this ratty old chair that came with the place and stared out into space. I remember it scared us both something awful because he didn't move. All he did was stare. After a couple hours, he started drinking. He didn't say a single word. Once I got Sam to school and Dad to bed, he was talking in his sleep and said that he'd 'lost him' and kept saying over and over 'I'm sorry'. It wasn't hard for me to figure out what he meant, so I got his journal to find out where he'd been. I just looked up the phone number and called. I didn't know who I was calling. I thought you were civilians. I didn't . . . Did I even use your name?"

Sounding like she was talking around a fairly sizeable lump in her throat, Ellen said, "No, but then, I knew who you were the second I heard your voice. I don't know how, but I did."

"I wish I could remember that part."

"It's not important. What matters is that you did for me what your dad couldn't, Dean. We loved him and we knew he loved us. Not like he loved you boys, but he did. Him not being able to face us when it was all over told me that. Now granted, I would spend the rest of my life being ticked as all hell at him for putting his little kid in that position, but I also knew your father. Knowing that he couldn't say what he needed to, it was the first thing that gave me a chance to forgive him. Believe me, forgiveness was a long time coming, but it came along eventually. I only wish he would have known that."

Unable to remember the actual conversation, Dean suddenly felt, after the explosion that had been thrust upon him by their little excursion to Philly with Jo, that he needed to have it again. At the very least, he needed to be sure that things were okay with them again. He had lost too much lately. He didn't want to lose this connection on top of everything else. Carefully, Dean asked, "Ellen?"

"Hmm?"

"Whatever my dad did, I am sorry. If I could bring Bill back for you and Jo, I would."

There was an almost unbearably long silence on the woman's end before her husky voice came back, "You are a good son, Dean. Don't you ever think any differently."

"Yes, ma'am," he said automatically.

A sniffle and a choking sigh later, Ellen added, "It's late. You had a long day."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Get some sleep. I'll see you whenever you boys can come around again."

Cautiously, Dean asked, "When should that be?"

"We're okay, Dean. You boys come around whenever. You are safe here."

There was another silence that waited for one of them to say something. After awhile, Dean cleared his throat. He could hear his voice aching as he made his request, but he was too tired and too damned spent to stop it. "Ellen? Can you do me a favor?"

"Sure?"

"Don't die on us. I don't know how much more of this we can take right now."

"Kid, I'm made of stronger stuff, I promise," she said, her voice sounding like she knew it was a lie but that she was doing her best to keep appearances for them both. "Get some sleep. I'll still be here tomorrow if you need me."

Yeah, that's what my dad said, too.

"Call me if you find Jo?"

"You'll be the first to know. Good night, honey."

"Yeah. 'Night."

Dean scrubbed hard at his face, wiping away the remnants of tears, dirt, and too much loss. He turned around, shoved his key in the door, and carefully closed the door behind him. He didn't bother to take down the sheets as he dropped onto the bed and turned on his side. He fell asleep watching his brother sleep peacefully at his side, the one piece of his father he now had left.

Duty sucks.

Loyalty sucks.

Love sucks.

You forgot to teach us that part, Dad.

Duty sucks.

(September 2007)