The job was easy. Just a simple ghost, salting and burning the bones would fix it. Too bad that was where Sam was supposed to be, salting and burning the bones. Sam Winchester had never been impeccable with timing, and unfortunately his brother was paying the price. Slamming the already dingy unstable door behind him, Dean Winchester took a second to bend over and catch his breath. "Hold it off, he said. I'll be quick, he said." he spat sourly. A loud, splintering crash sent the hunter sprawling over to the window on the opposite side of the dining in shock. The door wasn't going to hold the angry spirit for much longer, and Dean had tossed his empty rifle behind him at the front door, knowing that it was only dead weight now. He prayed to God that somewhere this bitch's bones were burning into ash. Another crash and the door was in half, Dean was whimpering like a child as he realised his fate. His stupid, pathetic fate was to die at the transparent hand of a common ghost, because his brother wouldn't push the fucking speed limit.
The glowing personification of a widow's grief floated towards him, her hand outreached. Dean flinched away and slid slightly down the counter, leaning against the cupboards. He tried to think positively, something he was never very good out except in the face of death. He thought about all the people he hoped to see in heaven. His soul was good enough for heaven, right? Surely all of his hunting demons outweighed all the deaths he'd caused? He'd get to see his Mom, his Dad, Ellen, and Jo. Oh god, he'd get to see Jo. Could you have relationships in heaven? Or do you just float around and chat with people? You're worrying about that now? He dragged his thoughts back to the present, and the glowing hand of the ghost was just inches from his face. "I'm going to die." He whispered, laughing slightly. Then, in hysteria, he yelled it out loud. "I'M GONNA DIE!"
"Not today you're not!" Dean heard the window behind him shatter, three times actually. Each pane being broken by a bullet, and a matching hole appearing in the hallway wall through the doorway. The ghost was momentarily confused. "What the hell?" Dean couldn't help but scream. "It's a fuckin' GHOST! What did you think a bullet would-?" The ghost threw it's head back, howling, before vanishing in what looked like excruciating pain. "The fuck-" Dean was more than a little confused. Slowly pulling himself up off the lino, relatively uninjured, he turned to the window, looking for his hero. "Organ donor." Dean spun around at the voice behind him. "I've been hunting this one for a while. Burnt the bones she was buried with, but her hips were missing. Did a little research, turns out she donated them to her future grandkids, knowing that her family had a history of serious hip related problems."
Dean couldn't speak. He thought he'd vanquished today's ghost already, yet here another one stood before him. The short, thin blonde woman standing in front of him glanced at him after surveying the room. "You're welcome?" She said sarcastically. Looking at his bedsheet face, recognising it, made hers break out in the biggest of shocked yet excited grins, one he had seen only a few times but cherished and missed with an immeasurable heartache. "It's you!" She squealed, swinging her rucksack off her back and onto the dining table she rummaged through it, tossing out a small handgun, few dinner knives, a pair of jeans, a jacket and a t-shirt. "Aha!" She shouted, her arm shooting into the air, her pale hand clasped tightly around a crumpled photograph. She held it up beside his dumbfounded face. Dean, still too shocked to move at all, just stared at her, but she was too excited to be crept out. Looking back and forth between the picture and his face she jumped up and down, her mouth making noises not normally associated with human beings. "It's you! Oh it is you! You're Dean Winchester!" Without thinking she closed the two foot space between them and wrapped him in a warm hug,
"Jo?" The word was hoarse, without tone out of his dry throat. He didn't return the embrace in the short time it was there. At the sound of the name she jumped back. "That's my name! Jo, Jo… Ha, Ha" She tried to push out the last name to no avail. "You know who I am, don't you? What was my last name? I've been Jane Doe for the last month, but it just doesn't fit. But now I'm Jo, Jo…" She raised her eyebrows at him. "Can you help me out here?"
The eldest Winchester just stared at her. Drinking in her presence, but at the same time wanting to run as far as he could in the opposite direction. She was really here. But, she was dead. Jo had died two years back, saving his life, as a matter of fact. "Harvelle." He managed. "Joanna Beth Harvelle."
She squealed again. "Yes! That's it! Jo Harvelle, Jo Harvelle." She tested out her name in different voices. "Jo, Jo Harvelle. Harvelle, Jo Harvelle."
Dean could barely speak, let alone string together full sentences. "You…Dead…Ellen…Hardware store…Hellhounds?" He tried to convey something along the lines of asking how the fuck she was alive. "Ellen! I knew her! I liked her didn't I? I really, really did." She looked at Dean shyly, unsure how to ask. "Were we, me and her..?" She trailed off, hoping he would connect the dots of her question. At first he was at a blank, not stringing together her sentences either. "Oh! God no! She was your mother!" He shook his head vigorously. She looked relieved. "Oh, great, 'cause honestly, I didn't really think I was, well I don't really feel-" Her sentence was interrupted by his lips crashing into hers. There was nothing professional or expert about this kiss, it was raw passion. He had missed her, his heart had ached for her for two whole years, and he didn't know how or how long she was going to be here. Real, tangible, part of this world. He was making use of the time he had been given, not caring why or what for.
At first instinct kicked in for Jo, she returned the kiss with the same amount of passion, passion she didn't know she could feel and seemed to be pulling from depths of her memory she had yet to find, which was 99% of it. After ten seconds though her train of thought came back to her and she pushed away. "What the hell?" She screamed at him, now a good few feet away. "What was that for?" Dean just kept looking at her, not saying a word. His Jo was back. His excited Jo, his angry Jo, just Jo. "Er, uh, sorry. It's just, I've missed you Jo." He offered a smile. "NOW WHERE THE HELL YOU BEEN?" He yelled at her. "I'M PRETTY SURE I WAS DEAD." She yelled right back at him, not taking any shit from the guy she could potentially call 'sexual assault' on. "Now, can you please, help me get my memory back?"