He was outside on a dark forest road. It was nighttime and drizzly. Confused, Sam looked back over his shoulder. He was standing on the front porch of a small, rather dilapidated condo.
"Hey, man, are you coming or what?" Zach Warren poked his head out of the Camry's driver's window. "Stanford's a couple of hours away and I still need to pick up Becky."
"Wha . . ." Sam blinked. This was the night he had left for Stanford, back in 2001. How had he gotten here?
"Sam!" John Winchester's gravelly voice burst from inside the condo. "Sam, get back in here right now!"
Sam turned to see his dad standing in the doorway. "Dad?"
"You think you can just run out on this family, you've got another thing coming," John bellowed at him. "I want your ass inside this condo this minute or I'm shooting your buddy and locking you in the trunk of the Impala until we reach the Mexican border."
"Dad, calm down, alright?" Dean appeared behind John's shoulder, looking surprisingly small and nervous. "Sammy, just . . . come back inside so we can talk this out, okay?"
"Dean," breathed Sam, crossing the porch and entering the small house. "Dean, thank God. Look, you've got to listen to me. I know you've got to be broken up about me being gone, but I don't want you to do anything stupid. Don't make any demon deals. You can't try to bring me back."
"What are you talking about, I'm not making any demon deals to keep you here," Dean said, confusion and hurt scrawled all over his face. "If you want to leave, then fine. Go. You take up too much space anyway."
John grabbed Sam by the collar and shook him. "You're abandoning us, boy. Leaving us for some high school friends who don't know a thing about you. We're your blood, we're your blood." With the back of his hand, John hit Sam across the mouth, splitting his lip.
"Whoa, whoa, hang on," Dean pushed between them. "Stop it, both of you! Right now, before I start blowing holes in the roof."
"Do you know how much I've sacrificed to keep this family together?" John strained against Dean's restraining arm across his chest. "You think half the time I didn't want to dump you two at the nearest mall and never come back?"
Dean's face froze, his resistance going slack before he turned and left the room, slamming the bedroom door behind him. John seemed to have realized what it was he had just said and shot a nervous glance after his oldest son. Sam took the opportunity to duck toward the front door. This was a painful memory – not something he wanted to relive. Besides, he had something he needed to do. Dean still needed saving.
"You walk you that door, don't you ever come back!" John shouted at him.
Sam looked over his shoulder at his dad, standing there smoking with rage. And then he left.
And walked right into his apartment at Flagstaff.