Disclaimer: I own nothing Supernatural.

Author's Note: Haha, you thought I went and forgot all about this fic, didn't ya? Well, I didn't, not really anyway. So I know it's been a terribly long time since the last update, and I apologize for that. But good news! I have posted this for your reading pleasure.

So, the next chapter is going to be the last. I just have to decide who's POV to do it from. Let me know what you'd prefer. Until then, enjoy!

Sam POV:

"Did I fall and hit my head or something?"

"Uh, I don't think so."

"Cause the strangest thing just happened to me."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah. Jake just handed me these papers, with my signature on them. And they say…well, apparently I now own a garage. A fairly large, fairly expensive, full service, auto…mobile…repair…shop. And I gotta tell ya, I really don't remember buying it."

I glare down at him and… Ah ha! Stiffening of the posture, clenching of the jaw, and, yep, his eyes just got a little wider. Caught. Now we just wait for the clearing of the throat… "Ahem," yeah, "I meant to talk to you about that."

"So talk." Now it's time for the nervous…there it is, the patented I-know-I-should-feel-guilty-and-say-I'm-sorry-but-hey-I'm-Dean-and-you-know-you-love-me laugh. "Dean," I say as sternly as I can. And his mouth falls shut. "What the hell, man?"

"I was going to tell you," he says, suddenly all defensive, like he actually has a right to be.

"You were going to tell me? After you forged my signature?"

"Come on, it's a good investment."

"Are you out of your mind?" I mean, seriously, a garage? Why don't you – or should I say I – just buy a freaking mini-mart or a doggie salon! I don't know why he does this shit. Just to get to me? I win the lottery, like two days ago, and he's already going out buying…crap. Really big and expensive crap.

I know he's watching. I can feel his eyes on me. Probably thinking up some coy little comment like, 'Jeez, Sammy, you're gonna wear a hole in the carpet if you keep pacing like that.' Or, 'Sam, calm down. I haven't seen you this excited since we stayed in a hotel that got PBS.' Jerk. I just know he's thinking that, and I know he's gonna say it, or something like it.

But instead he mutters something so low that I can't quite make it out. And it sounds sincere, not like some kind of dig under his breath, but something he wants to say and just can't. So I stop. And spin to face him. And say the only thing that comes to mind. "Huh?"

"I said, I bought it for me. I own it. It's my garage. Jake sold it to me." What?

"But…my name…"

"Yeah, well, couldn't exactly put it in mine. Kinda suspicious, don't you think, dead man buying a shop?" Yeah, that would be kind of weird. But… "I put your name down because I wanted it to be legal, you know? Eventually somebody'd figure out that I wasn't really Hamato Yoshi." This is true.

"So why didn't you just tell me? I could have signed those papers – "

"I didn't want you to," he says, cutting me off. "I didn't want you to buy it for me. It's mine. I'm just using your name is all." Yeah and my money. "And I'm gonna pay you back." Okay, creepy. "Well, not really, but you can take it out of my share."

"Your share?"

"Of the winnings. Lotto." I know what he's saying, I know what he means. But for some reason it's not all coming together in my head yet. "Yo, Sammy, ya getting me here?" And apparently he can see that because he's got this look on his face like I must have some kind of look on my face that says I've got no freaking clue what the hell is going on.

Oh, wait, maybe that's because I don't!

"Why would you buy Jake's garage?"

"He was selling. I told you, it's a good investment."

"Bullshit."

He sits there at the kitchen table, paper splayed all out in front of him, coffee cup in hand, and stares. Just stares. As though I'm supposed to know why he'd go off and do this, this crazy, bizarre, impetuous thing. I might have some abilities, but I'm not a mind reader. "I thought," he starts, putting down the mug and ducking his head. "I thought maybe I'd try something different. For a while. Just for a little while."

"Something different?" But as soon as the words leave my mouth I realize what he means. Because there's only one paper in front of him. And it's local. And it's the comics. There's nothing circled, no weird and unexplainable incident that qualifies only as a blurb in some small town midwestern journal. There's no small town midwestern journal at all. He's not looking for anything. Something different.

"I'm gonna run it for a bit, the shop." He gets up and refills his coffee, grabs another mug and pours some for me. But he doesn't bring it over right away. Instead he stands at the counter, with his back to me, and says, "They've been having a rough time, Jake and Sal, so I figured I'd help them out."

I know it's not true, not entirely. But I also know, can tell, that he wants me to believe it, believe that this is the reason he's staying. Oh my God, he's staying. "So…you bought it, and you're going to run it…for a while."

"Yeah, just for a while," he says returning to the table and offering me the coffee.

"So, you're staying." I mean it as a question. I meant it as one. But what does it matter how it comes out, I already know it's true.

"Yeah, well, you know, for now anyway."

I nod and sip my coffee, say nothing more, because I'm kind of getting the impression that he's said everything that needs to be said. He's staying. Here. In Nevada. For now at least. I want to ask if that means no more hunts, but I'm not sure I really want him to answer that right now. He might say no.

It was one thing leaving for college the first time around, leaving Dad and Dean. It was tough, and not just on me, and not just, I don't know, emotionally or whatever. Logistically, they had some trouble adapting, at least that's what Dean said the first time he called.

They had been dealing with some pissed off spirit and apparently Dad went to the cemetery where he thought the guy was buried while Dean went back to the haunted house to make sure it was gone after the salting and burning. But Dad got the wrong body and the ghost wasn't really gone, and it came up on Dean and busted him up pretty bad. He laughed about it on the phone a couple weeks later when he finally called. Said it was his own fault, he hadn't been paying close enough attention. Truth is, he'd been so used to my being there – ready with a shotgun full of rock salt, always watching his back – that he didn't even think to watch his own.

And that was then, when they had each other still. Yeah, it was an adjustment, but really, they managed. Now? Now Dad's off getting his life together, or trying to. And I'm heading back to Stanford. And the idea of Dean being left behind, left alone…it's never been a pleasant one regardless. Because I know how much he loves us and relies on us, and, yeah, in a lot of ways, really needs us. But I know he'll be okay. He has to be.

He's the strongest person I know.

That said, the thought of him hunting on his own scares the living crap out of me. I know he's done jobs here and there by himself, but they were always ones Dad sent him on. They were ones Dad knew he could handle. Dean doesn't always have that same radar, that ability to figure out when something might be too much and then back away. He's just not like that. So I knew that by leaving I was running the risk of losing my brother forever. Because it would only be a matter of time before he got in over his head.

And I was going to tell him not to do that. I was going to say, 'Dean, man, think before you act. Don't just go into anything, guns blazing, hoping for the best.' And I was going to suggest that maybe we could still work together sometimes, not often, but sometimes, on things that he might really need an extra set of hands for. Even though a big part of me never wants to touch another gun again. Or speak Latin. Or have to buy salt in bulk. I was going to tell him to come to me if he came across something he couldn't handle on his own. And I was going to pray every night that he'd be able to figure out what those things might be.

I was going to say all of that because, honestly, I never thought my brother would stop hunting. I only ever wished it.

"Sammy?"

I look up and see him sitting in front of me, looking at me in that way that tells me I've been staring out into space for a while, long enough for him to be concerned. "Yeah?"

He shrugs his shoulders and says, "It's not a forever kind of thing. Staying here…it's just temporary."

"Yeah," I say, holding back a smile, "just for now."

"Yeah," he says, looking like he's trying to do the same, "just for a while."