"I win again" Dean said with a smile as he took in all the chips that were on the table.

Mary looked at her son, then at Caleb.

"Really, Caleb. Teaching Dean how to count cards, awesome idea, really" She asked nostalgic.

"He's good at it?" Caleb asked unsure.

"Oh, I can see he's good at it, but I didn't want my kids to learn such traits."

"Come on. You know deuce is one hell of a mathlete, he'd have figured it out anyways…" Caleb said.

Mary was about to protest, when she realized he did have a point.

"Fine, just don't keep him up too late. He has a tough day ahead of him" Mary said as she turned around and lifted a half asleep Sam of his chair.

"I won't" Caleb said.

They waited until Mary was out of the room and the two looked at each other.

"Finally, now teach me how to scam credit cards like you promised you would when you had me promise you to never tell my mom I could count cards until this moment." Dean said.

Caleb sighed. "You remember every promise don't you Deuce?" he asked afraid of the answer.

"Damien, how dare you doubt my brains" Dean said with a smirk that only meant one thing. He knew he was right and was showing it to the world.

"… Dean would you get out of bed already! We have an appointment in two hour!" Mary said irritated as she was cleaning up Dean's side of the room, picking up dirty socks.

Dean stiffly sat up and groaned, squinting his eyes against the light.

"… Why are we getting up at 5.30 in the morning?" he asked, half asleep.

"Because we have a doctor's appointment at 7.30 and it's a bit of a drive there" Mary said as she stopped cleaning and stared at her oldest. He was still a bit pale, but his cold was gone and he wasn't congested anymore.

"You feeling ok, sweetie?" Mary asked concernment in her voice.

"I'm fine, mom" Dean said as he sat up, legs swinging beside the bed. He stopped getting up and scratched underneath the bottom and top of his brace, hand disappearing within his t-shirt.

"Itchy?" Mary asked.

Dean merely nodded.

"I could ask your father and try to shower you" Mary offered.

Dean shook his head. "No, thanks. I'd rather be itchy than have dad holding me while you bath me" he said as he finally stood up and carefully loosened the sling around his arm, carefully slipping it off, followed by his shirt. Since he was only clad in boxers, he easily slipped on a new shirt and struggled into a jeans and a hoodie, carefully rearranging the sling back around his neck and shoulder he grabbed a couple of socks on his way and walked towards the hallway.

During all this Mary noticed that Dean was moving much more fluently…. At least something was heading in the right direction.

"Mom, I thought we had to hurry up?" Dean asked.

Snapping Mary out of her thoughts, she smiled. "I'll be right down, Sweetie".

Dean and John were sitting in the waiting room, waiting for Dean's turn. Sammy had already gone in to his doctor, accompanied by Mary.

"Winchester, Jonathan. Room 306" the lady on the speaker called.

"Why'd you had to sign me in as Jonathan?" Dean asked irritated.

"We didn't, signed you in as Dean but your ID says Jonathan's your birth name, so that's the one they're using, now come on" John said as he let Dean walk out front of him, following him into the appointed room. There Dean's doctor, Dr. Jason, was waiting for him.

"Jonathan, nice to see you again. Have a seat. You too John." Dr. Jason said.

Dean struggled up the bed and sat down, swinging his legs up and down, nervously.

"So, how've you been?"

"Good" Dean answered.

"Alright, let's have some test and x-rays and see if you've made some progress." Dr. Jason said.

Dean was lying on his side, with his face against the wall as Dr. Jason carefully removed the last part of the brace.

"So John, have there been any problems, regarding Dean's health or recovery?" Dr. Jason asked as he sat aside the brace.

John was looking at his son's back. The incision of the operation still covered by bandages.

"John?" Dr. Jason asked.

"Oh… uh… no, none. His cold's gone, the only real problem was the not showering and the boredom." John said with a chuckle.

"I can imagine that" Dr. Jason said as he carefully peeled the bandages. John watched intensely as he got a sight of the scar that was going to remain on his boy for his entire life for the first time.

It was a long obvious but thin scar that ran from little below his neck all the way down to the small of Dean's back. There were no stitches, as those had already been removed but the small dotting on both sides of the scar was still there.

"The incision healed perfectly. No infection, no irritation. It must've itched, didn't it?" Dr. Jason said as he threw the bandages away.

"Yeah" Dean said.

"Well, as soon as we get those x-rays we can see if you can shower alone or not. But now, I'm going to feel along your spine, test for sensitiveness, sores or pains, muscles spasms anything, alright? So if you feel anything out of the ordinary, lemme know." Dr. Jason said as he started at the top of Dean's back and carefully checked each vertebrae.

It went perfectly smooth until the doc reached a certain spot just a little above the small of his back, where suddenly Dean's back muscles pulled tight.

"Dean?" John asked worried.

"Even your dad saw the tremor Dean, where does it hurt?" the doc asked.

"Felt really weird.. I dunno… just not like the rest of my back, little bit sore, no real like… in the beginning pain." Dean said.

At that moment a nurse came in with Dean's new X-rays. Dr. Jason hang them up on the boards.

"Well, it probably felt different because that's your worst break was right there, which is the lumbar vertebrae. We put quite a lot of metal there, which probably led to less feeling around that area." Dr. Jason said.

"Less feeling? As in nerve damage?" John asked.

"Yes, but very minimum. It's just the spot where the metal pins were inserted, if I'd push a little higher, or left or right, he'd feel completely normal. So no worries." Dr. Jason said as he helped Dean turn around so that he'd be able to see the X-ray as well. "As you can see on these X-rays, there are a lot of metal pins and plates inserted all along your spine, for stability. The spot where you're sensitive is the spot where you can see the most metal. But along the metal you can see that your spine has healed along the fixation." Dr. Jason said proudly.

"What about growth? Will he be able to grow with the fixation?" John asked worried. Dean's always been kinda small for his age, late on his grow spurts.

"No it shouldn't be a problem, technology has evolved… if this had occurred a decade ago we'd have fused his spine, and he wouldn't have been able to grow, but now we didn't we merely fixed the spine and he is able to grow along it. There might be some pains, maybe even muscle spasms during his grow spurts… but besides that there shouldn't be any problems whatsoever."

"What about sports?" John asked.

"Depends which sport, the once where extreme pressure is put on his back I'd suggest a supportive brace, it'll support the lumbar vertebrae preventing any injury. Just a precaution" Dr. Jason said.

"Alright" John said.

"As for now. I'm going to give you a new brace, one that's less noticeable, less heavy and can be taken off to shower." Dr. Jason said as he walked towards a cabinet and grabbed a smaller, thinner white brace.

"It's almost the same, although less difficult." Dr. Jason said as he began to adjust the brace on Dean. "Just slip into the brace and close the Velcro bindings as tight and comfortable as possible. And viola! You're done!" Dr. Jason said, letting Dean sit up by himself.

"How's it feel?"

"Good"

"Great, that aside, your shoulder's healed enough to dump the sling, although be careful with sports… when it hurts stop… rest, ice it… continue another time, alright? Good, get dressed and I'll see you in 3 weeks." Dr. Jason said as he shook Dean and John's hands and walked out of the room.

"That went well, you lost more half of the equipment" John said with a smirk.

"Finally… it was about time, I was starting to get bored." Dean said as he shrugged oh his t-shirt and starred into the mirror, happy to see that the new brace was definitely a lot less noticeable and quickly shrugged his hoodie on.

"We noticed" John muttered and god an angry look from Dean, making John grin.

"Come on, let's see how Sammy's doing, so we can get out of here" John said.