Battle Creek, Michigan, July 2010

Lisa peered at the glass she held, twisting it this way and that to check that it was actually clean. The new kitchen was small and dark, needing lights on all the time just to see what she was doing. She let out a soft exhale as she rubbed the glass a little harder with the dishcloth.

Why hadn't she noticed that when they'd looked at the place? Because Dean's only concern had been that he could protect it, that it didn't have the big picture windows and sliding doors that made them vulnerable. She gave the glass a final wipe and put it away, looking up as Dean walked in.

"Hey."

Bright smile, because it didn't really matter where they lived. So long as he was in her life, in whatever capacity he could be. This last year … she hadn't lied to him, back at the old man's place. It had been the best year of her life, despite the difficulties. From the moment she'd met him, eighteen years old and doing her best to shock the hell out of her parents and prove … something to herself, she couldn't remember what now … he'd had a hold on her that had somehow never really died.

"Hey. Where's Ben?"

"Bike ride." She watched him walk past the counter, his eyes going straight to the windows, looking out to the street, his expression … more than concerned, she thought, more like worried. "What?"

His head bowed and he turned slowly back to the counter, leaning against it, and now there was more than worry on his face. He looked uncertain, and … a little desperate, she thought.

"I don't know what to do here, Lis. I mean, if I knew for sure what the safest thing was, then I'd do it. I'd stay here and look after you guys …," he looked down, shaking his head slightly, his voice getting softer as the next words came out, "or get as far away as I possibly can, but I don't know."

He lifted his head, his eyes meeting hers. She could feel that. God, she could see it. When they'd met, his cocky, bring-it-on decisiveness had been one of the most attractive things about him. He'd never looked uncertain, back then. Now, it seemed more and more, he was being pushed and pulled from multiple directions, and it was spinning him around, confusing him, worrying him.

"And I get what I've been doing lately, you know, what with the yelling," he continued with a grimace, rubbing his forehead tiredly, "and the acting like a prison guard. It's just, that's not me."

No, she knew that was true too. Until he'd hustled her and Ben out of the house and into the car and driven them to another state, telling her nothing but that they were in danger, he'd been patient. Even when he'd first turned up, and those first few weeks, living with his grief and pain, he'd tried hard to not take it out on them.

"You tell yourself you're not going to be something, you know?"

She looked into his eyes as he continued, feeling his pain, feeling that insecurity, but not sure what she could say or do. He was scared that something, from his past, would come after them. She didn't even know what that meant, not really. He hadn't really told her about his past.

You didn't really ask much, did you? She squashed that voice. Some of the things he had told her, some of the things she'd seen for herself, when he'd turned up at Ben's party, well, her curiosity had shrivelled up and she'd found herself not really wanting to know much more.

"But my dad was exactly like this. All the time," he said, his face screwing up as he pushed some thought or memory away, his eyes closing. "It's scaring the hell out of me."

It was another thing she didn't understand. He'd been a great father to Ben, taking time to spend with her son, always relaxed and patient with him, supportive and disciplined without ever being harsh. It was why his behaviour over the last couple of weeks was so strange, so unsettling to both of them. This was the first time he'd even mentioned his father.

Guess what! He had a whole life before he met you! That voice, the one she didn't want to hear, piped up again. A life that you know nothing about!

"Dean." Lisa walked around the end of the counter, looking at him as she banished that voice again.

She'd spent the last two days thinking about this, while he'd been gone, relishing the peace and routine in the house, and aware that it was there because he was not. It was breaking her heart. Her dreams, her hopes of what the future might have brought were shattered, because once Sam came back, he wasn't hers anymore, he wasn't the Dean she'd gotten to know over the last year. He belonged to his old life again.

"Can I be honest?" She waited for him to listen, to shake off the past and come back to the present. "Maybe we're safer with you here, maybe gone. I don't know. The one thing that I do know is that you're not a construction worker. You're a hunter. And now you know your brother's out there, things are different."

He turned to her, his expression vulnerable in a way that she'd hardly ever seen in him, and she could see that he already knew what was coming, that he was bracing himself for what he thought she was going to say.

"You don't want to be here, Dean."

"Yes, I do," he countered immediately, the complete certainty in his voice lighting up a small hope that one day he might choose them, choose to stay with them over Sam, over the life that brought him pain and misery, choose … her.

She couldn't ask him about that now, she knew. He was too unsure of what was going on, too torn between what she thought he saw as his responsibilities. It would only derail the rest of the conversation she needed to have.

"Okay," she agreed, nodding. "Okay, but you also want to be there."

His gaze cut away from her, and this time he didn't say anything, didn't deny it and she felt her stomach turn over. She didn't know how to ask him about that life, she realised, and she couldn't tell, didn't know him well enough to be able to tell if he would ever quit. Maybe, if they had enough time, had a way to deal with his life, they could work something out. Maybe. If the monsters – the past – he feared didn't kill him first, if he didn't decide that they would be safer away from him.

"I get it," she said quietly, her chest constricting a little at the conflict she was watching. Wanting to stay. Wanting to go. Needing both and unable, really, to have either. She looked down, trying to find the right way, the right words to get them through it. "You're white-knuckling it living like this. Like … like what you are is some bad, awful thing. But you're not."

She hadn't understood it, not really, the way he felt about himself. For most of the year just gone, he'd been careful to keep it hidden, along with his past, and it only came out occasionally, sometimes on the tail end of a nightmare, sometimes in a reaction. Most of the time, she wasn't sure what she'd seen. Guilt maybe? Or shame? She didn't understand what he was feeling and, she admitted to herself, on those occasions, she'd been too afraid to ask. Afraid he'd turn away. Afraid he might leave if she demanded too much of him. She'd watched in silence. Not asking.

So, every time he'd lost control, revealed something of that internal struggle, his face would close up, and he would turn away, and fight to shove it down again, and not let her see him until it was gone. They'd never talked about it; it was one of the many subjects they didn't discuss. But she knew he was scared. Scared of something that had been a part of his past, something he drank to blot out, to keep away from them.

Those first couple of months, after he'd shown up, they'd been hard. Hard for her, but harder for him, she'd thought. He'd spent most of the time locked in grief, or frustrated and angry, and she'd finally had to tell him that it wasn't working, he wasn't trying. He'd changed, almost overnight, after that conversation. And they'd had their ups and downs over the year, more ups than downs, she thought. He'd told her a little … just a sketch, really, of what had happened. Enough for her to realise what he wasn't saying, enough for her to realise that inside of him was a depth of pain she would probably never see, because he would never let her see it. She'd thought that, in time, he would be able to face it, face his memories, and share them with her. But they ran out of time, when Sam came back.

She was happy that Sam was alive. Because so much of Dean's anguish had gone with that knowledge. But, it had stopped them, their relationship, cold. Now, he had someone else to talk to. Now, he had other things to do. She didn't know if what he'd felt, how he'd been with her and Ben was real enough – was important enough to him – to overcome that old life, but she was pretty sure he couldn't keep living like this, wound up so tight he couldn't think clearly, could only react, uncertain and worried about everything.

They needed to work this out another way. And she needed to know, once and for all, what he felt about them. She wasn't a shrink, she didn't know how to find her way through his thoughts or deal with his pain, she hadn't even finished high school, for god's sake, but she thought they had something and she was willing to fight for that.

"But I'm not going to have this discussion every time you leave. And this is – this is just going to keep happening. So," She took a deep breath, looking up at him, "I need you to go."

She watched that hit him, saw his throat working as his gaze dropped to the counter to hide his reaction, then slowly lifted again to meet hers, his eyes shadowed and unreadable. "I can't just lose you and Ben."

Lisa shook her head. "That's not what I'm saying."

"You're saying, hit the road."

For a moment, his feelings were all there, and she felt a split-second of something, something hard and liberating and a little triumphant. She didn't want to look at that feeling too hard, because maybe it would tell her something about herself that she'd pretended not to know.

It didn't matter, she thought. She'd needed to see what he felt, and she had. He needed to make a choice, needed to put his cards on the table.

Her voice softened a little as she said, "Dean, if there's some rule that says this all has to be either/or, how about we break it?"

His head tilted a little to one side as he looked at her, lips parting slightly, trying to work out what it was she telling him.

"Me and Ben will be here," she explained. It would be easier on all of them, she'd thought. Easier for her and Ben to get on with their lives. Easier for him to have what he wanted. "And you come when you can. Just come in one piece. Okay?"

"You really think we can pull something like that off?" he asked, and she could see he was trying to buy some time, time to give his emotions a chance to settle, time to think if her tentative plan would work, time to realise that he wasn't going to lose them.

"It's worth a shot, right?" She smiled at him, and his mouth lifted slightly, though he couldn't meet her eyes again. When he did look up, one brow lifted slightly, he looked relieved.

"You scared the crap out of me, you know that?"

"Sorry."

She wasn't, not really. She'd given him a back door, an out clause, and it had scared her to death to do it, even knowing how much he needed one. And she'd needed to know how committed he was, if he wanted to be with them or not. She was glad that he did, but her heart was still thumping from the possibility that he might have just agreed with her, and gone.

"Yeah … sorry." His mouth twisted slightly as he looked at her. "When does Ben get home?"

"'Bout an hour and a half, he said." The corners of her mouth tucked up slightly, the dimples to either side appearing.

"Plenty of time." He lifted his gaze to the ceiling above them. "Feel like making it up to me?"

She laughed at the suggestive one-sided smile he offered her, and nodded, holding out her hand.