A.N.: Hey All! So if you are keeping count we are up to chapter 11! Crazy right? This thing was supposed to be 3 chapters tops, but then it kept mutating and now it is THIS. This has been a labor of love and I appreciate more than words can say all of the lovely reviews that I have gotten from yous guys :D Remember back in Chap 6 when I asked for any requests of things you would like to see in this story, well this is what LastBishop asked for. I hope you like! Thanks as always for reading my stuff. *cyber bear hug* Enjoy!

Disclaimer: Not mine.

He wishes that he could pinpoint the exact moment the conversation had started to go south. He's been sitting here, across from Ellen, for the last twenty minutes and not once did a giant neon stop sign pop up, nor did a voice warn him 'Danger Bobby Singer, Danger!' Yet Bobby can see the storm raging in her eyes and her smile dies a quick and sudden death on her mouth. He didn't know what he had done wrong, but he knows he is going to pay hell for it.

She pushes out of her chair and he stands in an attempt to sooth her temper before shit hits the fan.

"Ellen," he starts.

"You've said enough Bobby." She replies.

"Come on El, don't be that way." He goes to reach for her hand just as they cross across her chest.

"I've got to get to work." She grumbles and storms off in a flurry of righteous anger leaving Bobby to stare, confused after her.

She waves tersely at him, tightening her apron at her waist before she pulls a jacket from the closet and disappears out of the front door.

What the hell had he done? They had only been talking about what a useless jackass her boss Tom was, and really if he didn't know for a fact that Ellen spiked his drink with holy water the first day she got hired, he would be seriously worried that Tom was just a meat suit for a demonic son of a bitch. That was how much of a dick he was. He had mentioned to Ellen that if her job was so awful maybe she should just quit, stay at home. He couldn't remember saying anything awful enough to merit her 'I'm gonna rip you a new one' face.

He was flipping through one of his many research books when his cell phone chimed from his pocket. And God, he hoped it was Ellen since he had spent the last ten minutes trying to figure out what he was going to apologize for when he finally did call her.

"Hello?"

"Bobby?" The voice that comes from the phone is male.

"Dean?"

"Yeah, it's me. Sam and I are going to be in the area in a couple of hours and we were just wondering," his voice gets cut off and Bobby can hear the phone being pulled from his hands as the eldest Winchester lets out a indignant cry of "Dude!"

"Hey Bobby, it's Sam. We've been eating out of the back of the car for the last week, and Dean is starting to smell," Another tussle for the phone and then Dean is back.

"I do not smell! Unless it's like roses bitch!" He sighs. "Bobby, Sam and I are about to kill each other, can we swing by for some R&R?"

"Why are you even asking boy? You know Ellen has a soft spot for you idjits." Bobby runs a hand over his face.

"Just Ellen? Come on now, what would you do without us?"

"Have fewer ulcers and gray hairs for one." He mutters.

Dean chuckles on the other end and Bobby can hear Sam ask. "What did he say?"

"So yes or no Bobby?"

"Get your asses over here. And try not to kill each other; I don't want to spend a perfectly good day cleaning blood out of your car."

"Alright! Tell Ellen we will be there for dinner."

"Sure will. See ya soon."

"Wait a minute."

Bobby's hand freezes on the phone.

"What is it?"

"You and Ellen okay? You sound funny."

Goddamn Winchesters, always stirring the pot.

"We're fine."

He can almost see the smirk on the punks' lips.

"That bad huh? Think maybe we should stay away Sam?"

Bobby tightens his hand on the phone. "Think maybe you should mind your own business and shut your hole before you end up sleeping in the dirt."

There is silence for just shy of a minute before Dean takes a deep breath. "We'll see you in a bit."

Bobby wants to make some stupid flippant comment back but a dial tone is blaring in his ear.

Apparently someone should have revoked his talking privileges for the day.

It's about thirty minutes later as he is idly surfing channels on his TV when there is faint flutter of wings and a trench coat clad angel is suddenly standing in front of him.

He about jumps out of his recliner before exclaiming. "Cas! What is it? Are the boys okay?"

Castiel looks from side to side, scanning the room for some invisible danger. "Yes, the Winchesters are intact."

Bobby lets out a sigh of relief. "Thank God. What are you doing here?"

Cas peers around the corner into the kitchen and then back at the man. "I was sent to 'scope out' the situation." His fingers put air quotes around the word sent and Bobby can't help but scoff a bit.

"What situation?"

"Dean indicated that you and Ellen were having a dispute."

Bobby swears he is going to kill the kid for this later.

"We're married." He says in way of an explanation.

"I am aware of your union."

"Fighting comes with the territory."

The angel tilts his head in way that reminds Bobby a hell of a whole lot of some sort of bird and states. "I don't understand. Perhaps it would make more sense if you told me what 'went down.'"

More airquotes. Cas has been hanging out with Dean way too much.

"Would if I could, but the problem is I got no damn idea." Bobby says as he sinks back into his lazy boy.

Castiel looks confused, or Bobby thinks it is confusion on his face; hell could be happiness for all he knows. The angel isn't exactly expressive.

"What do you think is wrong?"

Bobby flicks the television off. "I really don't know. All I did was tell her she could quit her job and stay home and she got all bent out of shape. I'm not a mind reader, she took off after that." He sighs into his hands. He hates it when Ellen is mad at him.

"That seems like an extreme reaction to an insignificant remark."

"You're telling me."

The angel shakes his head slightly. "I still do not understand."

"Join the club. We meet every Thursday, bring booze."

"I will inform Dean what I have learned about the situation."

"Which is?"

"Nothing." He says and is gone leaving Bobby with his thoughts once more.

He doesn't know if he will ever get used to the angel passing in and out of his home with barely more than a sigh of wings.

He is just fixing himself a sandwich when his phone rings again.

"Dean."

"Hey Bobby, look I was informed by Sam that I was being an ass earlier."

"Smart kid that Sam." Bobby smiles.

"Yeah, yeah, so I'm sorry if I ruffled any feathers."

"Speaking of feathers, you sent Cas to check in on things?"

"Yeah, I didn't want to walk into to some sort of bitch fest between you and the Mrs. I already got my own wife to deal with." Dean barely gets the words out before he cries. "Son of a bitch!" and Bobby can hear a hefty blow land.

"Sam?" He inquires.

"Right in the ear, damn that hurts!"

Bobby chuckles. "One of these days you're gonna learn to keep your mouth shut."

He hears Sam say "Not likely." In the background.

"Where are you two at? You had any more luck tracking down the devil?"

"About an hour out, filling up the tank. And nope, wherever he is Lucy is sitting nice and tight. How bout you? Find anything in the library?"

"Nope. There ain't a lot written about the devil except to leave him the hell alone."

He can't be sure what Dean would have said in response because his phone is beeping to show his other line.

"My other line is beeping; you boys try and get here in one piece."

"Yes sir."

Bobby switches over to the other line. "Hello?"

"Bobby?"

"El."

"Yeah, it's me. I'm coming home."

"Good. I think we should talk about what happened earlier."

"I think we should too."

"The boys are coming over. Sorry I should have called you earlier."

"Shit. How long?"

"About an hour."

"Okay, I'll see you soon." She hangs up and for umpteenth time today Bobby has no idea what the hell is going on.

She walks into the house still and quiet and he can't figure out if he would rather have her slam the door and rant and rave rather than this silent and lethal grace that she approaches him with now.

"Bad day?" he questions as she shrugs.

"Not one of my better."

"Anything I can do to help?" Bobby stirs the pot of stew on the stove and looks at her sideways.

She jerks her apron from her waist and lays it on the table. "Do you want me to quit my job?"

"No! I want you to do whatever you want to do." He places the wooden spoon on the counter and turns to face her.

"Because I can't just sit here at home, cooking and cleaning and barefoot. I just can't."

He feels his eyebrows rise up into his receding hairline. "What?"

"I work because I need to feel like I contribute to this family, I work because I would go insane in this house with all these books and pictures, thinking about Jo and what she is facing and," she gulps and her eyes go down to the floor.

Bobby slips his arms around her shoulders. "Ellen,"

"I know I bitch about it. I know I complain, I know Tom is Satan's inbred half brother, but it keeps me busy. I couldn't just not do anything."

Bobby kisses the top of her head. "That's not what I was saying El. I was saying you should work here."

Ellen steps away from him. "What?"

"Here. In the salvage yard, with me."

"Why? I don't know much about cars, what good would I do?"

Bobby pulls his cap from his head and runs a hand along his graying hair. "Plenty. Hell you have helped fix up the Chevelle with me enough times. I'm getting old; my legs ain't what they used to be."

Ellen eyes him with suspicion. "What are you talking about Bobby Singer? You're fit as a fiddle, you don't need me."

Bobby rolls his eyes towards his stubborn, bull headed wife. "Yeah, but I want you here."

Ellen looks like she can't speak for a minute and her eyes mist over with tears.

"Hell woman, I didn't mean to make you cry." Bobby scratches the back of his head with a huff.

She giggles and he can't think of a single bad thing in all of creation when he hears that sound.

"How long till the boys get here?" she whispers.

"Uh, bout forty minutes. I'm trying to get some food fixed for them."

Ellen crosses in front of her husband and flicks the burner off before turning back to him with a sweet smile.

"Ellen," Bobby starts and she passes him and heads to the stairs.

"Come on then, we only got forty minutes."

Bobby can't get up those stairs fast enough.

The boys stay for a couple of days and Bobby employs Deans help making the new scrap yard sign and when Sam takes a quick snapshot of Ellen and him in front of it, Bobby thinks besides marrying her in the first place he's never made a better decision.

Most days she comes home from work feeling tired and frustrated and like she has three layers of filth to wash off of her, but nothing that a shower and dose of her husband won't fix. This day she comes home and her hands are shaking in anger. Bobby looks at her from his place on the couch as she thrusts her coat into the closet.

"You're home early." he says and holds up his glass of whiskey as she passes by him.

She takes it out of his grasp and downs it in one long gulp.

"Want some food to go with your liquor?" he asks as he reaches up to reclaim the empty tumbler.

Ellen plops down next to him with a weary sigh. "Can we just veg? Sit around and do absolutely nothing?"

Bobby throws his foot up on the coffee table as his arm goes around her. "Nascar or the food network?"

Ellen leans into his shoulder with a small smile. "Food network. You need all the help you can get."

Bobby brushes a quick kiss to her temple as he turns the TV on.

It's not until later that night when Bobby is just starting to drift off to sleep that Ellen tells him what is going on.

He sits up and rubs sleep out of his eyes as he turns the nightstand light on.

"A hunter came in today."

She chews on one of her fingers as Bobby leans in towards her.

"I'm guessing the story don't end like that."

She shakes her head. "They come in from time to time, not as often as at the Roadhouse, but they still come in."

He nods and places a hand on her arm, gesturing for her to continue.

"It was a girl...about Jo's age." her voice trembles.

"She was holding her guts in with duct tape of all things. She...she collapsed on the floor. Freaked the rest of the patrons right the hell out and Tom was in the back counting out the money for the deposit. She bled out in my arms." She pauses and her husband arms circle around her in a protective vice.

Ellen makes a soft gasping noise and then continues. "She was too far gone, I tried to help her, tried to stop the bleeding, but she was too far gone. Tom was all pissed off about the bloodstains, here is this girl literally dying in my arms and he is worried about the goddamn mess she is making!" rage fuels her voice and her hands tighten into fists. "She gasped out ghoul and I'm sorry mom and then," Her hand flies to her mouth to keep in the rest of the words and her nausea.

Bobby cradles her face to his chest and she takes solace in the musty smell of books and residual engine oil on him.

The young woman's eyes are haunting her, blue and wide and terrified and Ellen feels sick at the thought of Jo ever looking that way. Dying in a stranger's arms. Never knowing how painfully proud her mother was of her even if that pride takes a back seat to the gut twisting worry.

Her sounds of distress are muffled into his body and for the first time in as long as she can remember she cries herself to sleep.

When she wakes up in the morning Bobby has already slipped quietly out of bed and she can hear him tinkering in the front of the house.

He looks up at her with a smile and a wave.

"Did I wake you up?"

"Nah, just the ruckus you're making." She looks around at the mess. "What are you doing out here?"

"Working out some frustration and it doesn't cost me fifty dollars an hour so bonus." he hefts the sledge hammer up and into the damaged cars frame.

"Does it really work?" she leans up against a pillar on the porch.

"Well get your ass on down here and find out."

Turns out it does and Ellen is feeling much better by the time she goes back into the house to start lunch. She has to go into work in a couple of hours and she plans to spend every second before then taking in the good because Lord knows when she gets to work there is going to be enough shit going around for seconds.

Bobby takes a healthy swig of his ice tea and Ellen just wants to savor this moment, tuck it away in her heart for later need of warm and fuzzy feeling.

She is talking about the pros and cons of murdering Tom or at the very least locking him in the cooler for a couple days when her husband says. "If work's so terrible why don't you just quit?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean you should quit. You shouldn't put up with that shit, you could stay here and,"

She doesn't hear anything else because all she can hear is her blood rushing in her ears and all she can see is her being a doting little housewife. She knows somewhere back in the rational part of her psyche that Bobby can't possibly mean that and he doesn't think of her that way, but between the flash of horrified blue eyes and the poor girl's nameless face melting into Jo's she can breathe, let alone think.

It's astonishing how fast she goes from fine to insane and before she knows it she is flying out the door. It's not until she pulls up in front of the bar that she realizes how foolish she is being, but she doesn't know what the hell she would say to Bobby to make things right now and they have always done better on a face to face basis anyway.

She's mechanical at work and by the time Tom has come over to ask her if bleach will take the red out of the wood she can't take anymore.

"Shut up Tom."

"What? I'm trying to run a respectable place here, can't have some loser runaway coming in and bleeding all over my floor."

"Some loser runaway?" Ellen begins her voice just below a roar. "That loser runaway was someones daughter! She was someone's loved one, she mattered!"

Tom took a step or two back, raising his hands. "Whoa mama bear I meant no offense, just not a fan of cleaning up messes.'

"Oh you meant offense, you have done nothing but mean offense since the day I met your cantankerous and vile ass!" Ellen slammed her fist down on the table.

"Cantankerous?"

Ellen shakes her head with disgust. "Look it up you moron."

"Hey, I'm your boss. You can't talk to me that way!"

Ellen wrestles with her decision for just a moment and then she looks Tom straight in the eyes, a little gleeful that he flinches.

"Were my boss." she states.

"What?"

"You heard me, you were my boss."

Tom's face turns red at her words.

"What the hell does that mean?"

Ellen beams at him. "It means I quit you asshole."

He looks at her in shock. "But you're my best bartender, people love you."

"I quit." She turns away from him and heads to the door.

"What I am supposed to do now?"

Ellen pivots towards him with a humorless chuckle. "I for one recommend learning how to not be a terrible person otherwise when you die you are going find out what an evil son of a bitch really looks like."

Her high from quitting has left her by the time she gets in the door and mostly she is just exhausted and she swears to herself, to God to whoever is listening that she will call Jo first thing tomorrow, tell her that while she doesn't support her decision to be a hunter she supports her and she will be there for her from now on.

Bobby and her make the decision to work together and Ellen doesn't know how she could have ever thought that Bobby would want her to be a housewife. Oh well, chalk it up to a bad week and a troubled mind.

The picture of them in front of the scrap yard sits in front of his desk and every time Ellen passes it she feels a swell of pride from the privilege of being his wife.

A.W.: We are closing in on the home stretch, only a couple more chapters left. God bless all of you for hanging in. :D