Even though this is tiny, do you know how good it feels to be writing Supernatural again?

SO GOOD. :D

Anyway…I've definitely thought of dabbling in Bobby/Rufus before, but tonight…nghhhh, my HEART. It just…commanded to be written, I thought, lol

So…enter slashery coda to 6X16.

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It's odd, really, the moments remembered when there are no more of them left.

Just then he could have thought of anything, anything at all from the first moment he'd just described to the boys down to that last in Omaha to everything after that had never quite felt real. Any of it, damn near a whole lifetime's worth, but all he could think of was Texas.

They were good times then, when enough time had passed that he was starting to realize he was going to have a whole life without Karen that he couldn't live only half invested in it. Beyond that, he'd hit the point where he'd spent enough time hitting the road with Rufus to realize that sometimes, even when you thought your life was as good as over, it really really wasn't.

By the time they hit Texas on a werewolf job it was July, hotter than hell, and there was enough in the air between them to add another 10 degrees. Back in Ohio the week before they'd given in to it for the first time, fucking on the hood of Rufus' current rattletrap on a back road. If it had just been that it might've eased up or changed or even been forgotten, but when Bobby'd been thrown out a window two days later by a spirit and come to with Rufus' jacket wrapped around him, his aching head pillowed against a warm shoulder, well…

That was more than fucking, more than the occasional drunken kiss.

So it was Texas that he remembered, maybe because it was then that he'd first dared to look ahead, to see his life in terms of highways and motels, salt and holy water and gasoline and think anything other than wishin' he'd died when that demon had taken his wife.

There'd been some comments made at a bar, men in the corner muttering on everything from the color of Rufus' skin to the way they sat too close as they drank their beers, arms brushing on the counter. He'd had enough, and he'd whirled on them, fists flying before Rufus could ever bother to try to remind him it wasn't worth it.

A knock down drag out and some speed driving later he was sitting at a stop sign in the next town, listening to Rufus as he finally trailed off bitching about how they couldn't afford to go around picking fights. He'd reached over and put the car in park, silencing Bobby's own "The hell are you doing?" as he reached over and took his face in his hands.

"Most downright crazy fool I've ever seen, you know that, Bobby Singer?" A little harsh, but he was still smiling, blood welling on his cracked lip where the motion was splitting it back open.

"Don't think I ever said I wasn't." Because, well, really…he hadn't. He'd promised to work hard, to learn to hunt and to follow Rufus' lead on a case. He'd never promised to always keep his head down. Or that he'd always think first and do something sane later.

Rufus had leaned in and kissed him then, sure, without reservation. He could still feel his lips now, rough and cracking and bleeding but perfect. Absolutely perfect, because they were his, and he'd kissed Bobby then like an affirmation of a decision already made. It was pure certainty, tongue deliberate as it coaxed his lips open to lay claim. There was a steady kind of heat to it, a compliment to the humid air pressing in through their rolled down windows.

When Rufus pulled away he chuckled softly, wiped at the corner of Bobby's damp lips with the pad of his thumb, sat back and said no more until a few miles on. Bobby blew into Hondo, Texas, past a sign proclaiming "This is God's country, don't drive through it like all hell", and they laughed so hard his ribs had ached, and by the time the sun came up, he'd been thinkin', this is it. The rest of his life, until the job took him early and he went down swinging.

He'd never had much of a problem with Rufus hating him. Well, he had, of course he had, but it had been its own grim comfort. After awhile, they were talkin' again, and seeing that burn of fury in his eyes every now and then…well, it was better than nothing at all. A hundred times worse than the looks he used to get, but better than cold indifference, better than demon black. Better than dead, and at the end of the day, in their line of work that was really all that mattered. He hadn't needed Rufus to forgive him or even stop hating him, not really. He'd wanted it, but hell…he wanted a lot of things.

In the wake of everything, just then, he can't cry. All he can feel is the cut of the cold wind on exposed skin and the furnace of late night Texas heat, the taste of Rufus' blood on his lips and the blue label now coating his tongue. It's all he knows right away, that, and the contrast between the two, where he's been and where he is.

He kneels down, presses the bottle down into the soft ground, palm pressing a perfect handprint into the damp ground just to the side. He swallows, searches for words Rufus might accept. One day, maybe soon, he'll come back here and apologize again. That's the thing about graves; they can't deny you.

He's never been quite eloquent, and it's all too much, too sudden.

"Take care of yourself up there." The whisper rasps out, foreign and almost utterly unrecognized, and he clears his throat, wanting his voice nothing but steady when he turns and heads back toward the cars.

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