A.N.: Content warning for this chapter for: mentions of child abuse, neglect, and alcoholism. John Winchester, yknow?

Lawrence, Kansas - 2001

The river ran behind both of their houses, but Dean and Grace always preferred their hideout under the bridge into town. It was a warm spring evening, right on the edge of summer. They'd met up on the river bank after Grace left work. Dean had spent all day working on his car, looking forward to seeing her again. Sure, he'd seen her the day before, but still.

Now the two of them lay on the grass, watching daylight fade above them. If he blocked out the memory of the vampire he and his dad had just spent the weekend hunting down, and the thought that they would be leaving to kill a shapeshifter in Arkansas in the morning, he could almost pretend that he had a normal life. That's what people his age did in their free time, right? Work on their cars and wait for their girlfriends to get off of work so they could spend time together?

"Dean, I know there are things out there, bad things like what you and your dad take care of," Grace said, watching the sky turn a hazy purple. "But do you think there are good things out there too?"

"Like what, like angels?"

"Can I tell you something?" she asked, propping herself up on her elbow.

Dean sat up so he could look at her properly. "Of course. Anything." He could feel the knot growing in his stomach. "Is something wrong?"

"No, I just…" She instinctively reached for her necklace, the one she never took off. When she first came over for Sam's birthday, when they had all been really little, she had been wearing the same vial around her neck. To school, to work, to parties, to the beach. She never took it off. Dean had been tempted to ask about the silver vial, but he figured there was a complicated story behind it. "I know you see a lot of horrible things. You were burning bodies when you should've been celebrating getting your driver's license. I want you to know that there's good out there too. I know it."

Dean smiled, looking at her tired eyes. "Gracie, I know there's got to be good out there if the universe brought you to me."

"Somehow that's not the cheesiest line I've ever heard from you, Dean Winchester," she laughed, leaning in to kiss him.

"My turn to tell you something. I've been thinking long and hard about this, and Gracie, I love you."

"I love you too."

He reached up to kiss her, seconds later cut off by a voice from across the river. "Dude, is that your brother?"

"Shit." Both of them turned to see Sam and three other boys headed down the bank with a bunch of fishing gear. Sam was staring right at them as his friends elbowed him. Without breaking eye contact, Dean instructed, "Go get in the car. I'll take you home and get back to the house before Sam can say a word to Dad."

"You still haven't told him?"

"Sam or Dad?"

"Either? My parents have met you."

"Your parents won't say it, but I'm pretty sure they hate me. And Sam's gonna hate me too if we don't disappear right now." As soon as they were safely in the Impala and on the road, Dean started to laugh. "Sammy's gonna kill me."

"I assumed you'd told him," Grace said, staring out of the window. "You offer to drive me home all the time. He knows you come to the diner and get more free milkshakes than I'm supposed to give you. He knows I sit and talk to you while you're working on the car. He's not an idiot, Dean."

Keeping his eyes on the road, Dean shook his head. "It's not Sammy I'm worried about. He'll come around eventually. But Dad, Dad always says not to get attached. Sam's got his life, but Dad and I, you know what our lives are like. We try to keep Sam out of it. You've seen it, more than you should have. Dad likes you. He just doesn't want me to miss you."

"He never let you live like a normal kid. You never had the option to get attached before."

"It is what it is. That's the life, you know?"

"I know you idolize him, but he's a drill sergeant who uses your mom's death to justify a whole lot. And I know you love him, but I also know you're at least kind of afraid of him." Dean pulled off to the side of the road as she kept talking. "I also know you wouldn't hear this from anyone but me."

"Gracie," he warned. "Don't talk about Dad like that. He did his best."

The tension in his voice stung, but she kept talking. "That's not good enough. He's obsessed with that yellow-eyed demon, Dean. Now he's trying to turn you into him, and he's doing a pretty damn good job of it. I've seen him shut you down for trying to be you. You never got to be you. You never even got to be a kid. Hell, you were the one who raised Sam when you were way too young to have that burden on you."

"Grace."

"You hardly ask for anything. You're good, and you're loyal, even when he comes up with some bat-shit crazy idea. Bobby was a better father figure than your dad ever was, and he was just your dad's friend." She paused, trying to keep her composure as all of her hatred for John Winchester came bubbling to the surface. "He left a ten year-old in a motel to take care of his six-year old brother, without enough food between the two of you but he sure as hell was certain to leave you a loaded shotgun and tell you to shoot first and ask questions when whatever came through that door was dead."

"Grace, you stop that right now."

"Or what, you're gonna hit me? You've already told me about how he drinks, about how you don't want to cross him when he's angry. You took me home when he got drunk and… he'd yell at you as we walked out of the door. I don't see them any more, but I used to see the bruises. I still see how you flinch when he raises his voice, even if it's not at you. He's already instilled so much… so much self-hate and doubt and feeling like you're never enough. He trained you to be a soldier and never let you be a kid. Do you know why we end up at the river all the time? Or why you're so much more willing to be open with me, tell me how you feel, and just be… you? Because that's the one place you can look up at the stars and pretend we've got a normal life. And because I let you. I let you be sweet and kind and caring and… everything he tried to beat out of you."

"That's it, we're going home." Dean sped the next few blocks to her house, Grace talking all the while. When they pulled into her driveway, he turned to her again. "Anything else you want to say before I kick you out of my car?"

Even in the dim lights of her front porch, Grace could see the tears welling up in his eyes. "Actually, yeah. How old were you the first time he killed something in front of you? How old were you when you realized he was using you as bait? How old were you when he came home, only to kick you out because you said - or you were - something he didn't like?"

"Gracie, I love you, but -"

"When was the last time you had a birthday? Before I made you a cake, and you hugged me and told me that no one had ever done that for you, not since your mom died? Did he even remember your last birthday, Dean?" She sighed, unbuckling her seatbelt and letting the tears stream down her face. Hesitantly, Grace leaned over, kissing his cheek before moving to get out of the car. "I love you. But I don't want you to turn into your father. I don't want to marry a man like him, and I don't want to have a family with a man like him. You're better than that. Think about it. I'll call you when I'm off work tomorrow. Good luck with Sam."

Dean sighed, watching her walk into her house. He sat parked in her driveway for another five minutes before slowly driving home, dreading what would be there waiting for him.

A Few Months Later

"Are you out of your ever-loving mind? There's no way in Hell you're ever marrying that girl!" John Winchester was many things, but subtle was never one of them. "She's going away for school like Sam, and we've got a job to do! You know how much I wanted a normal life for you boys, but that's over." Something shattered in the house as Grace walked up the front steps.

"Dad -"

"Listen to me, son. Hunters don't have happy endings. There's a reason we don't let civilians get involved. Monsters will use them to get to us, and innocent people die in the process. Don't you even think about it."

Grace swallowed the lump in her throat, gently knocking on the door. She carefully balanced a small birthday cake in the other hand, waiting. She couldn't hear Dean's reply, but she certainly heard his father shouting after him as he got closer to the door. "You're gonna go break things off with her right now, young man."

"Not today, Dad. I can't, not today."

"And why the hell not?"

Grace could tell they were both standing right behind the door, so she knocked again, pretending like she couldn't hear a thing going on inside. "First of all, it's my birthday. Second, I love her."

"If you really love her you'll keep her out of harm's way. She's not in this life. She's still safe for now."

"She isn't? Tell that to the shtriga she wasted in Albuquerque. And the demon up in Delaware. The werewolf in West Virginia. The vamps we hunted last weekend. She may not have as many kills under her belt as we do, but she's in this. She had her chance to get out, but she didn't. If the evil in the world hasn't realized yet, it's not paying attention."

"Dean Michael Winchester, you -"

Grace had heard enough. She wrenched the door open, putting on the sweetest smile possible. "Good afternoon, Mr. Winchester. Happy birthday, Dean." Dean immediately relaxed, but his dad was still bristling. "Would you like some cake, Mr. Winchester?"

Dean reached out for her, his voice full of concern as he said, "Gracie, we should go."

Locking eyes with his father, she took Dean's hand. "Yeah, I think we should. Let's take your car."

As soon as they were on the road, Dean started apologizing. "I don't know how much you heard, but Dad can be a bit unreasonable at times."

"I heard enough. Thank you for defending me."

"Gracie -"

"Do you really want to get married?"

"Some day, yeah. Not right now, since you're going away to school and all, but some day," he smiled, glancing over at her as they came up on a stop sign. "I love you, Gracie, no matter what Dad has to say about it."

"I love you too. Sorry I didn't make a pie, but cake is a little more fitting for a birthday. Let's swing by the diner so I can grab some utensils. I would've borrowed them from the house, but..."

Dean smiled, glad that even though he lived in a world full of chaos and uncertainty, he at least had her. "Sure thing."

The Bunker - Present Day

"So this pearl… is it some kind of cursed object? Now you're an Internet lawyer, Cas is a soldier of heaven, Dean killed me and he's on the run, and the kids don't exist," Grace recapped, staring incredulously at Sam. "And now 2003 John Winchester is sitting in the war room?" She leaned back onto the refrigerator, crossing her arms. She'd pulled Sam into the bunker's kitchen as Dean and his parents were theorizing about the alternate timeline they'd accidentally created.

"Pretty much. I don't know how it works, but we're having one normal night before we fix it," Sam told her. "We've got to reset this. If Cas is a soldier of Heaven, if he never questioned his loyalty, then that's just the tip of the iceberg. Lucifer might win in this one. We don't know."

When they emerged from the kitchen, the Winchesters stopped talking, John staring at her. "Dean." He'd taken on a warning tone, one that Dean knew meant trouble. "I thought I told you not to put her in danger."

"Dad, she was part of the life a long time before that. She didn't grow up in it, but she grew up with it," he defended, Grace coming to stand behind him. She put her hands on his shoulders, John glaring at the wedding ring on her finger.

"Dean Michael Winchester, I told you not to marry that girl."

"He can do what he wants. He's not yours to command around," Grace scoffed.

The reaction was instant. Mary reached out for her husband as Dean reached up for Grace's hand. "John -"

"Grace -"

"No." Grace's voice was low, calm, measured. Deadly. "He did this for years. But he's dead. He's supposed to be dead, anyway. You're an adult. You're allowed to make your own choices. He bullied you for too long."

"Young lady -"

"John!"

"Grace, Please, just let it go," Dean warned out of habit. She could feel him getting more and more uncomfortable as his father got mad. "Don't we have some pie somewhere? Let's grab a drink and some pie for everybody, and we can -"

"No. It's not something you let go of. You're an adult. You're allowed to stand up to him. I saw what he did to you." She stared John down as she continued, "I saw the bruises. The fear in your eyes when you'd drive over to my house in the middle of the night with Sam. You didn't think I knew, did you? You didn't think I'd see Dad put the tent up in the back yard so you guys could camp out, or hear him fold out the couch downstairs so you could sleep there for the night and be gone by morning." Mary looked at her husband in disbelief. "You didn't think I'd put it together when you'd call me from different motels because you were afraid, because you didn't want to be alone while he sat in the car, watching the door, using you as bait. I still wake up in the middle of the night to you saying 'Dad, I'm sorry' in your sleep."

Dean stared into the bottom of his beer, not knowing what to say. Sam avoided making eye contact with anyone. Mary seemed like she was in shock, unable to believe how her husband had changed since her death. John was the only one capable of speaking. "Young lady, you have no business telling me how to raise my children."

"You had no business hurting and neglecting them. You were all they had. You know why Bobby threatened you with a shotgun the last time you saw him? Because he knew how much you reminded him of his own father. I know the boys love you, but I'm glad you're not in our children's lives. I'm glad you're dead, John Winchester." Having had enough, she turned to Sam, since Dean was still adamantly staring into his drink. "Let's fix this. If you guys don't send him back, I will."