Chapter 25.

Dean was sitting on the floor, his back against the side of the bed. He felt a little stiff and cold, but it was hardly the first time. He felt okay. He felt calm, albeit with the usual undercurrents of fear and guilt, but calmish was good enough for him. In a few hours, he could go downstairs and make breakfast for himself and Sarah and she would never know that he had spent the night awake.

That plan was wrecked by a quiet knock. The door slowly opened and light came into the room. Sarah, bundled in a thick red robe, peered at him with worried eyes and said, "I thought so. Why are you awake? Recovering from a bad dream or avoiding one?"

"I'm okay." he said.

She went over to what he thought of as Sam's bed and sat down. "I'll wait here."

"For what?" he said.

"For you to go through the usual script of lies and half-truths and get to the point where you're ready to really talk."

"Sometimes I don't sleep a lot. It's no big deal." he said.

"You can't be very comfortable down there." she said, "But then, that's the point, isn't it? If you get comfortable, you'll fall asleep."

He was too tired and too stressed to argue. "Yeah." he said.

"If you're determined to stay awake, we should go downstairs, sit in comfort and talk. I could make tea or coffee, to help you stay awake."

"You're okay with that?" he said. He had expected some disagreement.

"Of course. If you need to be awake, I won't stop you." she said.

"But you should go back to bed." he said, "You need your sleep."

"The older I get, the less I sleep." she said, "And I'd rather have good company for my wakeful hours than be lying in bed worrying about how you are. I would be worrying, you know."

"If I'd been a little quieter ... "

"It's as much what I didn't hear as what I did." she said, "I'd have known."

"You are one scary lady." he said.

"You are one scary man." she said, "Sitting here in the dark, brooding on Heaven knows what and thinking you have to handle it all alone. You could have woken me. I wouldn't have minded."

"No, I know you wouldn't." he said.

She stood and offered her hand to help him up. He didn't need the help, but he took her hand anyway, knowing the love in the gesture. Once he was on his feet, he held it a moment longer, needing her maternal affection as much as he needed to let her know he appreciated her kindness. Then he let go and she led him down to the kitchen.

"Coffee?" she said.

"Please." he said.

"I'll make it strong." she said, "You go sit in the parlour. Light the fire. Once the coffee's brewing, I'll grab us a couple of blankets. It gets cold in the early hours. I don't know about you, but these old bones need their warmth."

He didn't answer. He just let her gentle devotion embrace him. Whatever his flaws and faults and wrongs, Sarah Kranz accepted him just as he was. She cared whether his body ached and longed to soothe the pain in his heart. He didn't refuse the offer of a blanket and soon he was on the couch, the blanket around his shoulders while she sat in her chair with hers wrapped around her knees.

"You're not wearing your watch," she said, "Which suggests you at least tried to sleep."

"I tried." he confirmed.

"But crouching on the floor makes it very clear that you wanted to be awake. What happened?"

"If you didn't ask, we could both pretend nothing did." he said hopefully.

"Repression and denial? Didn't we agree those were bad things?"

"I've always kinda liked bad things." he said, "All the good stuff is bad."

She went to fetch the coffee. As she put his mug into his hands she said, "You want to talk as much as I want to listen. Why hold back?"

He shrugged. He sipped his coffee.

"Do you think I can't take it? Because I can and I will."

"Maybe I don't think I'm worth putting you through every bad night." he said.

"It can be hard, to break out of a set pattern like that. I'm not your father, Dean. I'm not any of the people you decided to protect from your pain. I need your pain. I need to be needed. I need to help you and this distancing thing you do only makes that harder."

"Tonight, it's stupid stuff, all of it. I've got thoughts running through my head and I'm not worrying about Cas and I should be and I keep seeing fire and I don't know why. Saying it aloud, it sounds even more stupid."

"Don't worry about how it sounds. I will never think you are stupid. Let's start with the fire. The obvious possibility is that it's connected to your mother's death. Do you think that's the case?"

"No. I'm used to those images. They're always the same, like a video playing in my head."

"It sounds like you get them often."

"Yeah, all the time. It's not Hell either. There's fire in Hell, but the fire I'm seeing in these weird ... I don't wanna call them visions ... "

"That seems like a good word for them."

"Sounds psychic and I'm not psychic. The thing is, the fire is clean. It's about as far from demonic as you can get. I thought I was seeing an archangel attack on the bunker, but there was no fear either and there was no attack and now the fire has changed to lava, but it feels the same." He drank some coffee and then smiled at her. "You starting to regret listening yet?"

"No. I won't regret that, Dean. Go on."

"I thought it was the mind curse coming back." he saw her look of disapproval and said, "Okay, mind link. Whatever. There's no attack on the bunker by fireballs or lava, so I think I just felt Cas being confused about the fireballs because since the mind cur ... thing, I associate all visions with Cas first."

"That's plausible." she said, "Clean is an odd word to use."

"Yeah, it is, but it's how the fire felt both times. No fear, no guilt, no disgust like I get in dreams of Hellfire or Mom's death and no feelings like demons are laughing. It felt clean and ... I don't know ... not evil, not destructive. Fire can purify and refine, right? Maybe fire has more to do with why I'm here than with past losses."

"That sounds very positive." she said.

"Positive and a tiny bit terrifying. Why am I so afraid of this working out? I should want that."

"You do want it." she said, "You're here. You're talking to me. You know how much you need this to work, for yourself and all those who depend on you."

"So it's possible the fire stuff is me, telling myself to make it work? That's what I think now. And that would be a good thing, right? That would mean my subconscious is on board."

"Yes, it would." she said, "And that's a major step forward, isn't it?"

"I guess it is." he said.

"I think, before we discuss the Castiel issue, we may both need some cookies."