It's not long after they burn Sam's body that Bobby and Ellen figure out how sick Dean is. Months of not properly eating, followed by vomiting up most of the little he was getting down, has taken its toll, and they find themselves with a very ill, very delirious Dean who spends most of the time drifting in a haze of pain, crying out for Sam.
They end up having to put him in the hospital, which was probably the worst thing they could have done, because the damage is alarming, what with the scars from the suicide attempt, the regular beatings, and the…tearing.
Bobby ends up sneaking him out when he's stable enough to be moved.
He hires a private nurse, and she comes once a day to help out.
But what Dean really needs is someone to be with him all the time, to hold his hand and tell him things are going to be fine.
He needs Sam.
Jo's there all the time, finding work at a bar in town. She says it's because she wants to be near her mom, who's all but moved in with Bobby to assist with Dean's care, but Jo's fooling no one. She makes it her personal mission to be Dean's main caregiver.
Bobby has his doubts at first, Jo's like a female version of Dean to begin with, and he's concerned her equally sarcastic and acerbic wit won't do him any good.
In the end, it's exactly what he needs.
Jo's a bully. She bullies Dean out of bed, she bullies him into the shower, she bullies food down his throat. And instead of it upsetting Dean, it's working.
She convinces Bobby to put a TV and DVD player in Dean's room, and starts hitting the local stores to find movies she thinks he'll like.
Die Hard is the first to show up, followed by The Bourne Identity, Fight Club, and Ocean's Eleven.
Dean's not terribly responsive, he tolerates Jo, but he never smiles, he's still having terrible nightmares, and Jo's starting to wonder if anyone will ever be able to snap him out of it.
In true, stubborn Dean Winchester fashion, he does it himself.
About four months after they burned Sam, Jo and Bobby are in the kitchen when they hear the sound of laughter coming from Dean's room.
Rushing down the hall, Jo is surprised when she sees some guy on the TV with a crazy looking green puppet with purple hair. He's also holding what looks like a jalapeno wearing a sombrero…on a stick?
Dean is laughing so hard, he has tears streaming from his eyes, and when he turns to see Jo, he throws her the sexiest grin she's seen in months.
She's pretty sure, when asked later, that's the exact moment she went from infatuation to in-love with Dean Winchester.
On a sunny day in May, just a few days after what would have been Sam's twenty-eighth birthday, Joanna Beth Harvelle becomes Joanna Beth Winchester in a quiet ceremony officiated by non-other than Rufus Turner himself, who's insisting on performing a Jewish ceremony, complete with yarmulkes on all the men's heads, including Dean, who bitched royally when he found out he'd need a girly bobby pin to hold it on.
Dean's not complaining too loudly, as he smiles down at Jo, in her sweet little white dress, standing next to him under the Huppah built at the base of the massive oak where Dean and Bobby had made a small memorial to Sam.
It's simple, and beautiful, and it's everything.
As the sunlight shines through the trees, Dean and Jo are pronounced husband and wife, and as Dean turns, he swears he can see them, his mom and dad, and Sam, standing with the others, smiles on their faces.
ok, it totally suprised me, this happy ending. haha! there's an epilogue coming, and then i will be putting this little fic to bed. hugs!