Title: The Truth Hits Home
Author: nativestar
Word Count: 1,740
Rating: PG
Warnings: Spoilers up to 2x14 Born Under A Bad Sign. No pairings.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Summary: Post BUABS. After the demon's words, Jo visits the roadhouse and Ellen tells her what really happened to her father.

A/N: A huge thank you to both justruth and rafikiven on LJ for the betas. Written for koshkaphoenix on LJ for the family haven ficathon, using the prompt 'Ellen tells Jo what really happened to her father.'

Ellen bent over the table, wiped the surface and ignored the twinge in her back that told her she should have stopped several tables ago. Closing up for the night took twice as long these days and she had another five tables to clean before she could start putting up the chairs. Ash was 'entertaining' some girl in his room tonight and Ellen knew better than to go ask him to help her close up.

Jo didn't keep in contact anymore. And no, Ellen did not consider occasional postcards and sporadic phone calls 'keeping in touch' - something she reminded her daughter of every time she called which usually resulted in one of them slamming the phone down.

She couldn't keep treating Jo like a child, at least that's what Jo had vehemently told her when she'd first stormed out of the roadhouse. She never did hear Ellen's reply, no but you're my child.

Ellen heard the door behind her. Clearly the empty parking lot hadn't been much of a clue, that or they were arrogant enough to think they could score a drink past closing.

Ellen didn't bother even turning around.

"We're not open yet."

"Mom."

Ellen froze. She heard a shaky intake of breath and a quiver in the voice.

"Tell me what happened to Dad. The truth this time."

Ellen left the spray and cloth on the table and turned toward her daughter. Her healthy looking, non bleeding, beautiful daughter. There was a nasty red bruise on Jo's forehead, fresh and painful. It had the mother in Ellen was reaching out to examine the bruising as Jo leaned back, reminding Ellen that it wasn't her place anymore.

"You already know what happened to your dad."

"Not all of it."

"What makes you say that?"

There was silence and Ellen took pity on her.

"Let's sit down."

Jo nodded as Ellen righted a chair by the table she had just wiped. Jo turned in the opposite direction. Ellen frowned, she was leaving?

But Jo only went as far as the bar, returning with a bottle of whisky and two glasses. Ellen nodded her approval as Jo set them down on the table and grabbed her own chair.

"What makes you ask?" Ellen repeated.

"Doesn't matter."

"Does to me."

There was a moments silence.

"There was a demon. It said...It said some things."

"What things?"

"Doesn't matter." Jo repeated and Ellen let it slide this time. "Sometimes demons tell the truth, especially if they think it'll mess with your head…I need to know."

Ellen reached for the whiskey, pouring another generous measure for herself. She sipped at it, thinking about where to start. She wouldn't be able to get away with skimming over the details this time. As much as she had tried to protect Jo from the brutal truth, yet again a demon had taken that option away from her.

"John didn't tell me the whole truth. Least not straight-away. If it had been his choice he probably wouldn't have ever told me. As it was, he had no choice."

"Why?"

"I wanted to see the body. I wanted to see my Bill one more time. Say goodbye."

Jo nodded in understanding, but Ellen wished to God or whatever deity there was that Jo would never nod in understanding to that and truly understand it.

"John said if I wanted to see the body then there was something he needed to tell me. We sat down. Much like you and me now, bottle of whisky between us. We didn't bother with the glasses though." Ellen smiled softly.

John was haggard. Days without sleep had etched strong lines into his face that coffee couldn't touch. There was such a bone deep tiredness surrounding John that it permeated the air around him, drawing anyone close down with him.

"Ellen, Bill was badly cut up by it, you don't want to see that. You don't need to see that."

"You said it didn't touch his face, I just… I need to see him, one last time. I need to tell-"
Ellen's voice cracked. "It doesn't seem real John. How could-"

"It's real."

John took a large swig from the bottle.

"I killed Bill."

Ellen looked down into her drink, she was drowning in her own grief, how could she deal with John's guilt too?

"John it was the damned hell spawn. You know that. You can't go blaming –"

"Yes, I can. And you will too, you don't know the truth Ellen."

The words stopped her dead; her glass paused halfway to her lips.

"Truth? What truth?"

"There was so much blood, Ellen. And he was in so much pain. He knew it. I knew it. There was no coming back from like that."

Ellen's eyes were locked on John, begging him to stop talking like that.

"He asked me to stop the pain. And I did."

John killed Bill. Her husband. The father of her daughter. He might have made it, doctors were always pulling off the impossible, saving people against horrendous odds. John killed Bill and he was still talking.

"Bill's last words. The last thing he asked me for was to tell you and Jo how much he loved you. How much he wished –"

"Stop," Ellen whispered. "Just stop."

"I –"

"Please." She raised her tear stained face to him. "You killed my husband. By screwing up or by so called mercy killing it makes no difference. Bill is dead! So get out. Now."

"And he left?"

"Never saw hide nor tail of a Winchester again till his boys dropped round." Ellen downed the dregs of her glass and poured another for herself and Jo. "John screwed up, and his mistake cost Bill his life, cost me a husband and you a father. But I don't blame him for what happened after. Took me a long while to forgive John for taking away our last chance to talk to him but –"

"He shot him." Jo whispered, there was no surprise in her voice, just grim confirmation.

"Sam's dad shot my dad in the head."

"That what the demon told you?"

"It was Sam."

"Sam told you?" But John's sons had been as clueless as Jo about that hunt. John had never told them anything about the Roadhouse or the Harvelles. Unless they had been lying, and were now screwing her daughter around, in which case there'd be hell to pay. And Ellen had enough contacts to make that a significant reality.

"The demon was in Sam."

Oh God. It was all starting to make sense, in a horrible tortuous way.

"You get it out of him?"

"No."

"Someone did get it out of him, right?"

"I assume Dean did." Her voice held a hint of anger. "He said he'd call." It was clear that he hadn't. "I didn't want to believe the demon, but turns out it was all true."

"Oh sweetie, it wasn't like that. It wasn't like that at all."

"How? You just told me exactly what the demon told me."

"That demon twisted the facts. Made it seem like John was a heartless bastard, killing him when he might have been saved."

"You don't know the truth either; you only know what John told you. How can you be so sure he told you the truth?"

"You didn't see John's face."

"He put him down like a dog!"

"He honoured his last request. No matter the cost to himself, and John paid dearly," Ellen said firmly. "It took me a long while to realise that. My mother, your Grandma Ruth made me understand."

"Grandma? What does she have to do with this?"

"I didn't take you to see her during those last couple of weeks. The cancer and the treatment had left her…You didn't need to see that and she didn't want you to. You were only seven."

"I remember that. You were always at the hospital. You'd leave me playing round Mary-Jane's. Spent the night a couple of times too."

"Yeah, her mother was a real god-send looking after you like that. Anyway, your Grandma, she was in a lot of pain. The painkillers she was on only did so much and no where near enough."

Jo's eyes widened as she saw where this was going.

"Did she ask you…?"

"Once. It was a bad day. A really bad day. And I…I couldn't do it. I didn't…I wanted to stop the pain so much but I couldn't do that. I knew she wasn't going to get better. She was barely living and she only had more pain to look forward to but I still couldn't."

"That's awful."

"It was. I didn't pick you up from Mary-Jane's that night. Just went home and cried."

"That's when you forgave John?"

"Not straight-away. But later, I realised that what John had done was no different than what my mother had asked me to do. I forgave him but, trust me, John never forgave himself. He never hunted with a partner again. Hunters are some of the worst for gossiping, especially in here with their own kind. I heard talk and rumors of 'that bastard John Winchester' over the years, he never did make many friends. Sure, he went to others for ammo, advice, supplies that sort of thing. But he never hunted with anyone who wasn't kin."

Tears welled in Jo's eyes and it took everything Ellen had not to cross the distance and wrap her daughter in a hug.

"Will you stay the night?" Ellen asked.

"No. I…there's a possible haunting in Wyoming. I said I'd look into it."

Ellen couldn't say she was surprised, but she was disappointed.

"Will you call when you get there?"

"I'll try."

Jo stood. She was a smart young woman now. Not the naive amateur girl that had laid a credit trail to Las Vegas using the one person who would almost certainly cave under pressure.

She was still learning, but she was learning fast. When it came to hunting Bill was one of the best. Ellen was sure that despite her attempts to shield and protect her daughter from that life, Jo too was going to make a great hunter. Ellen stood and reached out for Jo's arm before she could leave.

"You are definitely your daddy's daughter." Jo held herself a little straighter. "He'd be proud of you."

"I hope so."

"I know so."

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