Disclaimer: I want, but do not own.

Author's Notes: I wasn't really planning on writing more on this, but I was inspired by the last episode when the brothers went home, and this popped into my head. I'll probably write another chapter eventually, but not immediately. Hope you guys like it.

My brother has terrible scars. Hell, we all do. What would you expect from a family who hunts evil for a living the past twenty years? We've got our fair share of bumps and bruises, broken bones and torn skin. I think the first time I went to the hospital for hunting injuries was thirteen. It was a poltergeist of some sort, threw me around like a rag doll. Dean and Dad thought I broke a couple ribs, but it was just bruises. Hurt like hell though.

But somehow…Dean's were always worse, and every time I see them, I'm reminded why I left.

A chance at a normal life was only part of the deal when I left the family. I wanted out of hunting so bad, it hurt. But I hurt for Dean more. I left to save him from his own damn heroics. I left before he could get himself killed trying to save me.

Every since this whole thing started…hell, this was how it all got started, it seemed all the evil creatures we hunted would come after me. Poltergeists, demons, ghosts, things that go bump in the night. For a while I figured it was because I was the smallest of the group, the weakest of the three Winchester hunters. But then I hit a growth spurt and shot past Dean by inches, something that I think still bothers him.

And the monsters still came.

In the middle of a fight, whatever evil we were battling would suddenly stop and turn on me, even if I wasn't the biggest threat, or the closest to it. I thought it was sort of ironic. Not only did I get picked on by kids at school (first for being a pudgy midget to being the tallest kid in the class over a summer and then for having lunatics for family members), but even the monsters felt the need to turn on me.

And every time they turned on me, Dean was right there in front of them, like some goddamn knight out on an ancient battlefield. My brother, the hero. The soon to be dead hero. I couldn't stand the idea that one of these days my brother was going to die defending me, right in front of my eyes…so I left. I broke my family's heart to save my brother's life.

In my mind it was a fair trade. We both lived the way we wanted to. He could concentrate solely on killing evil and I could be a normal person. I know he never saw it that way. I know if I were in his position, I wouldn't understand it. All Dean saw was that his brother abandoned him and his father after he spent his life trying to protect me.

How do I know this, given my brother is famous for his 'no chick flick moments' attitude? He might not want to talk to me when he's awake, but asleep is a whole other matter. I originally got the idea, ironically enough, from Sixth Sense. Dean answers me in his sleep…but better yet, he'll listen without interrupting.

Here we are, trapped in a little rinky dink hotel room in the middle of god knows where, my brother bloodied and bruised on the bed next to mine, and I can only think of one thing: would it have been better if I just stayed away?

Probably not. Hunting is not something you do alone, no matter how good you are. If Dean had abandonment issues before, he sure has hell got some when Dad disappeared.

Dad. There's a fun subject. When I announced I was leaving Dad threw me out of the house. I don't think I'd ever seen him that mad before. I could understand that – he didn't think I cared about mom as much as he and Dean did. But how could he just turn around and leave Dean like that? No warning, no contact, just…left. And didn't come back. Who does that to their son? Especially one as devoted as Dean? I remember growing up I sometimes hated him for having a closer bond with Dad, that he was the favored son over me. Dean defended every decision Dad made, from what we hunted, where we went to school, and kicking me out of the family, and then, Dad turned on him. And I hate him more.

What if I wasn't there when the Wendigo grabbed Dean? Who would've saved him? Nobody. He and the girl would've died, and then her brother, and anyone else who went out into those woods. Dad was supposed to protect us, to watch our backs. He yelled at me until his voice went raw about abandoning my family, and he did the same thing. Worse, maybe.

If I hadn't gone with Dean, he wouldn't be lying in the bed next to mine with foot wide bandage across his chest covering the claw marks from the flesh eating Wendigo, he'd be dead, strung up in a cave somewhere, and Dad wouldn't even know it. Some father. And you know what really bothers me about this? Even after all of that, Dean still wants to go after him.

Dean starts to mutter under his breath and all I catch is my name before he buries his face in the pillow, his hand white knuckled grasping at the pillowcase. I can't help but smile. I'll be able to torture him later about how it's my name he mutters in his sleep, not some woman's name.

"Dean," I mutter quietly, "why do you put yourself through this? Why not get a normal job and just be happy?"

I know the answer before he says it.

He shifts slightly in the bed and mutters sleepily, "Because it's the right thing."

Yep. My brother, the big goddamn hero, who was going to get himself killed one day being just that.

But not today.