Five Years Later

The little boy had an imaginary friend. He called him Dean. Said he always wore a leather jacket, golden necklace, and torn jeans. Said he was tall, with hazel eyes and sandy hair. Said that sometimes, when he got sad or angry, he would drip water onto the floor, or his shoulder would bleed a little bit.

Dean told the boy that he was always going to be there, told him once that the light was gone, and would never come back. Dean sounded sad, and the boy picked up on it. The boy told his daddy.

His daddy, a tall, dark-haired man named Sam, immediately went to the attic and grabbed an old journal. He flipped through the pages, shuddering as the temperature in the room dropped.

"I never hurt you," a sad voice muttered quietly from behind him. Sam spun around to see his brother, bleeding badly from his left shoulder and dripping cool water onto the exposed floorboards, "why don't you love me anymore?"

"What happened to you?" Sam asked, his voice barely a whisper as he looked into haunted and betrayed eyes, "what happened?"

"I stayed," Dean whispered, voice weak and high, almost like a child's, "I stayed, but you didn't want me. You got a wife and a kid, and you've never told them about me. I stayed to save you, Sammy. I keep the house safe, I keep the demon out. Isn't that good enough?"

"You can't stay here."

"I can't leave. The light's gone. They got tired of waiting, and I can't leave. I don't want to. I want to stay with you. I want things to be like they used to. Why can't we be brothers again?"

Sam sighed, finally finding the correct exorcism in the beat-up journal. "You don't have to wait for me," he smiled, "at least, not here."

"Wait," Dean pleaded, "you can't. I don't want to be alone."

"What about mom?"

"Missouri said she's gone. For good. Her energy… everything… like she never existed."

"Dad?"

"He's in Hell, Sam, and, just between you and me, I'm really not looking to go there."

"What about-"

"Face it, man. You're all I've got. Just let me stay. Please?"

Sam bowed his head and began to read as Dean's anguished cries filled the attic and he crossed over.

All right. The end. You can stop reading now and go on with your lives. Go check out the latest Director's Cut on CWTV... or do that homework... take up knitting... maybe review this wonderful little story:)