Dean was thirteen when he showed up with a guitar, saying he won it in a poker game.

Sam held back a smile, he couldn't pick his favorite thing about the whole situation: a) the fact that Dean managed to find a poker game and win it; b) that Dean was still naïve enough to think his Dad wouldn't bitch to seven hells and back about him bringing the guitar in the car; c) that Dean might be lying about how he got the guitar and still managed to be pretty convincing.

Never one to disappoint, dad bitched to seven hells and back. Predictable, yes, incredibly annoying though.

The thing is, Dean would usually jump at the opportunity to please their father – something that drove Sam nearly insane – and later would be moping around the corners 'cause even if dad had been pleased, or whatever passed for that, he'd be sad for giving up whatever it was that'd pissed dad off.

Not this time; the little dude put his dukes up and his foot down and Sam kept thinking that if his heart could explode of pride, it would be doing so in the next few moments.

Still John bitched, oh how he bitched, the guitar would take up precious space, there was no one to teach Dean how to play, and even if did learn how, John needed his sleep and would not be bothered by the out of tune waling of either the kid or the instrument, and Dean stood there, calm as a monk on morphine.

Sam would never know if Dean planed it or if the little fucker was just ridiculously lucky, but John was already scheduled to leave, and was running late with the whole argument, so Dean could keep the guitar. For now.

As dad slammed the door shut, Dean deflated and took a shuddering breath before noticing Sam and giving him a toothy grin "He's gonna murder me in my sleep!"

Yeah, dad probably would try to smother Dean with a pillow that night, but neither boy cared right that second.

In the following months, Sam would find Dean sitting outside their front door, mercilessly torturing the guitar and calling it "playing"; the kid had this illusion that closed doors were sound proof, so he'd always stay outside, never one to play in 'hearing range' if he could help it.

But Sam heard it. All the time. It was a pain and it was mesmerizing. And the first time the perfect sounding chords of Smoke on the Water seemed to echo in the stingy motel, Sam could've enrolled Dean into Julliard.

Then one day, between motels, the guitar simply vanished.

John coolly watched Dean run around desperately for a couple of minutes before commenting way too lightly "If you'd been more careful you wouldn't have forgotten it back there. It doesn't matter anyway, you know that thing took too much space."

Dean pressed his lips into a thin line – which was the closest the kid got to crying this days – and nodded sullenly.

In an unusual moment of self-control, Sam silently shot daggers into his father with his eyes and let Dean choose what they would watch for the night.

The next day, he got Dean a harmonica.

xoo0oox

Sam woke up before his alarm rang, which pissed him off to incredible levels, but got up anyway and headed for the shower.

He washed his hair and sang, keeping his voice in check not to wake Jess up.

"Today is gonna be the day… na na na nana nana to you… By now you should've somehow na na na na na na to do... I don't believe that anybody feels the way I do about you now..."

When he got out, Jess was stretching with her eyes closed, only this woman could manage to have just woken up and already be this gorgeous.

She smiled and opened her mouth, but the first words he heard came from outside the bedroom.

"Mother of God! It stopped! Have I gone death?"

Sam shot Jess a confused glance and she managed to keep a straight face for all of 5 seconds before bursting into giggles.

"Is it dead, Jessica? Did you shoot it? Did you give that wailing animal a merciful and well deserved death?"

Jessica bolted from the bedroom full out laughing and Sam was still lost.

Then, the night before came flying back to him and he remembered that Dean was sleeping on his couch just outside the door.

In fact, now that Sam was looking at him, Dean was just half asleep, his eyes not entirely focused like he'd been jolted awake by something pretty gruesome.

Wait…

"You heard me singing?!"

"If I heard…? Dude! There are cats in heat out there trying to tear down the door to answer your sensual mating sounds! Yeah. I heard you."

And it was then that Jessica's sweet laughter turned into the one of a cackling harpy.

"You're so full of shit! There's no way you heard me, Jess never hears me and I sing all the time in the shower."

Dean gave him a blank stare then disappeared back beneath his covers grumbling "Fucking morning people…"

Sam walked to the kitchen in a daze and found Jessica shoving cookies in her mouth to keep from laughing more "You could hear me?"

"The whole campus could hear you, jackass!"

"Shut up, Dean!" Sam pretended not to notice how Jess clamped a hand over her mouth almost choking "Seriously, Jess, why didn't you ever say anything?"

"She knew better than to poke a wounded beast!"

"Dean, I swear to God!" Sam threatened, but the effect was completely ruined by Dean's loud huff of laughter and Jessica's even louder giggle.

This situation never crossed Sam's mind, but even as it happened he realized that his baby brother forming an alliance with his girlfriend was his worst nightmare. Especially when said girlfriend was Jess.

"If I told you I could hear your-"

"Dying sounds." Dean supplied helpfully.

"- agonizing wails?" she offered back.

"Good one." Dean answered after a beat. See? That right there was why those two should never bond.

"Anyway, if I said I heard your wailing, you would stop. And I didn't want that. You seemed to enjoy it so much… It was cute."

"Your girlfriend's the one full of shit. It is not cute. It's not even funny at this ungodly hour, now could you two lovesick puppies shut the hell up while I get my beauty sleep? I need to bounce in a couple of hours."

"Already?!" Jess startled running to the living room "Oh come on! Why?"

Sam didn't need to follow, he could picture Dean stuffing the pillow in his mouth. "I ah… can't stay."

It had been a while, but Sam was pretty sure that was Dean Speak for 'I'm embarrassed to stay longer'.

Jessica did not have the same dictionary as Sam. "You are so staying! There's absolutely no way you're leaving this house."

"Are we discussing a hostage situation?"

It was Sam's turn to almost choke on cookies, if he hadn't been there for the most of Dean's life, he'd bet his brother was raised by wolfs.

But then again, when he considered his father…

"Oh come on… You so owe me to stay and dish out the goods on what I'm sure is a very condemning childhood."

"I owe you?"

"I gave you a roof and a warm bed, and you know I could've left you out there in the gutter."

"Golly gee, thanks, mom."

Sam finished his breakfast and checked the clock on the wall, he needed to leave or he'd be late for class. But leaving Dean and Jess alone seemed like such a crappy idea…

"Sam! You're gonna be late!" Jessica, the mind reader called from the living room.

"Oh my God, woman, shut up!"

Sam really wanted to tear a new one on Dean for talking to Jess like that – seriously he taught him better than that! – but she just laughed.

Sam's head peeked through the door and found Jess sitting on the back of the couch, leaning her legs on Dean's, who had a pillow on his face.

"I'm not sure I should go…"

"I should go" Dean groaned from his hiding place "Sam, I'm sorry. I get it now; you don't want me here, fair enough. Take the harpy away from me and I'll leave and never come back."

"You gonna let him call me a harpy, Sam?" Jess arched a brow.

"Fine, harpy was harsh… Banshee, maybe?"

"Sam! Your brother's being mean to me!"

"Sam! Your girlfriend is a lot heavier than she seems to realize! Get her off of me!"

Sam stared. Jess giggled and leapt off the couch. "We're just goofing around, Sam. You can go, I promise we'll be nice to each other."

That's not what Sam was worried about at all.

"Okay…"he sighed "I'm going."

"Have a nice day, babe." She smiled and got on her tippy toes to press her lips to his.

Dean made loud gagging sounds.

"Are you gonna be here when I get back, Dean?"

There was a tense silence hanging over their heads.

"With that gorgon of a girlfriend of your breathing down my neck? Not likely."

It could be Dean Speak for 'I'll try', or it could be that he thought Jess was annoying and would bail as soon as he got some coffee. Hard to be sure.

Once Sam was gone, Jessica decided to take pity on Dean and go back to the kitchen. Maybe if she cooked him something extra nice he'd stay a little longer.

She knew that no matter what Sam actually said – or didn't say really – about his family, he was lonely and missed them. He just had a mostly messed up way of showing it, like not calling and pretty much letting her think his kid brother was dead. What was up with that anyway?

They'd have a serious talk once he got back.

The smell of the coffee she was brewing started to take the whole apartment and it wasn't long before Dean was silently padding his way to the table.

"I thought it was too early for you" she commented lightly setting a mug in front of him.

"It is." he grumbled falling seated across from her "But you have coffee."

"Aren't you a little young to drink coffee?" she asked, pouring him some anyway.

He stared at her, all bed hair and bright, rested eyes. He didn't really look like Sam in general, but the look on his face? That expression? Completely Sam. It was what Sam looked like when he wanted to say something awfully rude to someone but held back.

Because that was Sam, he held back, swallowed and forced a smile.

But this is Dean, so he held back – Jess was never the one on the other end of that look, it shouldn't be so damn amusing – he swallowed and looked away, mouth pursed. He probably wasn't one to actually hold back on whatever he wanted to say, but he did it for Jess.

So it wasn't her fault at all when she nearly pinched his cheeks.

"I know what's best for me." he said darkly after a beat.

"Yeah, like every other eighteen year old."

Oh, there was that look again.

"Look, if my lack of caffeine is bothering you, I already said that I wanted to leave." he pointed at her with his mug "You're the one who manhandled me into staying so far."

She tried to compose herself, bur a grin made its way to her face. "I'm sorry." she wasn't really "I just worry." his face turned into a frowny pout "If you stay, I'll cook for you."

Dean took a long sip of his coffee, then licked his lips "You'll cook what?"

Of course Jess didn't tell him. What was the fun in that?

But this time, Dean took it like a champ, and grinned. "Do you need help chopping anything? I'm wicked good with a blade."

And he wasn't kidding. Kid was a freaking ninja and way more helpful than Sam had ever been. Not that Sam didn't want to help, he was just the kind of guy who burnt water. She was pretty sure that if someday they broke up, he'd starve to death.

After Dean finished with the slicing and dicing, Jessica kicked him out of the kitchen or else he'd ruin her surprise. He went with no fuss and that had her rattled. He wasn't gonna leave, was he?

It was a bitch to cook while trying to keep an eye on him, but she was nothing if not awesome at multitasking.

When the silence got to her, she checked to see if nothing was going to burn while she was gone and went to the living room. Dean was facing a wall, twirling a black magic marker on his fingers.

"Are you grounded or something?" her question made him drop the marker.

"Are you spying on me, you little perv?" he knelt down to pick it up.

"What's that for?" she pointed "Were you about to graffiti my wall?"

"Now you'll never know. Can I use your shower?"

Jessica didn't plate anything, there would be plenty of time for that after Sam got home, but everything else was done during the time Dean was showering, except for a batch of cookies still in the oven. She set the timer for that and had just plopped down on the couch when he reappeared, water droplets still rolling down his naked chest.

Jessica did not stare. She just froze in shock, that's it. After all, her tender sensibilities? Shot to hell.

"Dude!" she chastised "There's a lady in the house. That means no walking around half naked."

"There's a lady in here? I thought Sam went out!"

"Ha ha."

He pulled a gray t-shirt over his head, giving a small honest smiled and sat next to her. He was so enjoying this, the little attention whore. Dean kept saying he wanted to leave, but every time he got the chance he stayed and tried not to make a big deal about it.

She was so on to him.

"Go on." he said suddenly and Jess blinked.

"What?"

"It's obvious you're doing all of this trying to pull some sort of Stockholm Syndrome on me to get me to tell you embarrassing stuff about Sam, so… Ask away."

"You've considered me worthy enough to bare such knowledge?" she brought a hand over her heart "I'm honored."

He shrugged "Meh. I'm just happy that Sam finally chose a girlfriend smart enough to bribe me into liking her."

Now this was getting interesting. "You didn't like his girlfriends?"

"Not even one."

"He had a lot of them?" even if Sam had a billion girlfriends, Jessica wouldn't care, she was just curious because he never talked about it – now that she was thinking this through, Sam didn't talk about a lot of things. Huh. – and every time she asked, he's say that after he met her, whoever there was before didn't matter anymore. Which was sweet, but total crap.

Dean opened his mouth with such intent, Jess had no idea what to expect, then he stopped, looked at her and his lips twitched. "Not really, no. But he did have a lot of 'study buddies', which were a bunch of horny chicks who pretended to need tutoring just to spend time with him. And the dumbass helped them up until the point where they realized that the study date was more study than date and bailed. For someone so smart he can be totally clueless."

"How can you be so sure they didn't need tutoring?"

He snorted "I was the younger brother who supposedly needed babysitting. They were all humongous bitches to me, threatening me to stay out of the way."

"Did you tell Sam?"

"No way." then he added with a cheeky grin "I wasn't a reliable source."

Turns out he negotiated with them. The more they paid him, the longer he stayed at an arcade, burning through the money on the machines.

"Then there was this one bitch." he paused for a full dramatic effect "I offered her the same deal the others got. Unfortunate for me, she was the principal's kid and had heard a bunch of crappy stuff about me, most of which I didn't even do, but it was pretty solid blackmail material. Unfortunate for her, I heard Sam coming back; even more unfortunate for her, I could cry on command."

"Wow, you're evil." she said in soft wonder.

"Exactly. That why I said you're smart for bribing me."

The timer rang, Jess was heading for the kitchen when a knock on the door stopped her. "Could you get that for me?"

Dean nodded wordlessly.

The cookies were perfect, Dean's skills with guests? Not so much.

"May I help you?" soft words, harsh tone.

"Yeah…" Brady's voice was careful if not a little scared, it made Jess smile "Is Jessica here?"

"Maybe. Maybe not. And who the hell are you?" harsh words, soft tone.

This was just priceless, she was going to beg Sam for them to keep this one.

"Look, if I'm interrupting something-"

"No!" she shouted, peeking her head through the door "Not at all, Brady, come on in!"

Dean shot her the most bored look imaginable and stepped away.

"Well…" Brady looked around, fingers tapping his thigh "Isn't this cozy."

Jess stepped out of the kitchen wiping her hands on blouse "Dean, this is Brady. He's just an jerk from campus. We fed him once, now he keeps coming back."

"Ouch." Brady grimaced and Dean smirked from his spot leaning into the back of the couch.

"And this is-"

"Oh, I know all about you, Dean." the way Brady said that irked Jess. He had such a douchy sense of humor.

Dean seemed to agree, if the way his whole face tensed was an indicator.

"What are you talking about?" she went for amused but only got shaky.

"Dean Winchester" Brady enounced like a showman "The youngest, the runt of the litter. Mommy died because of you, didn't she? Daddy doesn't love you because of that, and big brother left you, that shows how good you are on his book."

"Brady, what the hell?" Jess scolded, horrified.

"Who are you?" Dean asked way more centered than she expected him to be, hands curling into fists as he inched away from the couch.

Brady ignored both of them "Hunting is the only thing you're not complete shit at, and even that you're fucking up by staying here. Disgraceful, really."

"Brady!" Jessica all but shouted, punching his shoulder "Cut that out! Jesus!"

This got his attention, but his face was all warped wrong, like she'd never seen before "Excuse us for a second, Dean-o. Your sis-in-law and I need a moment."

Dean lunged forward "No!"

Brady flicked his wrist and Dean was flying across the room, landing heavily on the wall. Jessica cowered away, from the monster wearing Brady's face and towards Dean.

The kid's eyes were slightly unfocused, yet his stare was alarmingly intense "Run."

"What?"

"Run, Jess." he shoved her and attempted to stand, but Brady was already there, smashing his head against the wall.

"Come on, now. You want sweet dear Jess all to yourself? That's pretty selfish, Dean. I'll have to teach you some manners after I'm done with her."

Jessica scooted away, but a hand grabbed her by the hair and dragged her into the bedroom, flailing and screaming.

"It's nothing personal, I hope you know that." Brady said sympathetically, letting her go. Relief was short lived when her back attached itself to the wall, like she was being pulled by a gigantic magnet and couldn't move away "I like you. You just happen to keep very, very bad company. And you're gonna die for it. Still, nothing personal."

She whimpered when the invisible giant magnet started pulling her up. In few seconds, she was standing, then her feet left the floor and she was still going up. Brady produced a knife, but Jess barely had time to appreciate what that could mean, the blade slashed through air and flesh, she felt every inch of it, but somehow, wasn't bleeding.

Brady sighed and cleaned the knife on his shirt "It won't be long now-"

Jess didn't understand the words that cut Brady off, gibberish falling over panicked ears, pure and simple. But she understood that those words were saving her life. She wanted to scream for Dean to keep going, but her mouth hanged open uselessly, no sound coming out, just as the blood wasn't flowing from her wound.

She was stuck to the ceiling, right over her bed, when the giant magnet finally stopped moving her. Brady's head twitched to the side, turning towards the words, and when he shot her a glance, teeth bared, his eyes were a murky yellow "I'll be right back, princess."

The words became rushed, frantic, but barely stopped even as Dean cried out. Jessica wanted to cry back, to tell him to keep going, to thank him for trying, to apologize.

A book skittered across the floor just outside the door and the laughter that wasn't really Brady's got louder and louder as Deans voice hitched – which wasn't reciting anything anymore – at whatever horrible thing was happening to him.

It was then, even over the blood pounding on her ears, Jess heard the hissed "No!"

And the "Gotcha." from Dean almost at the same time she was fell, face first on the bed.

Her voice was back, and she howled in pain as the cut on her stomach bled onto her hands and sheets. The tear racked sobs shook her body and made her throat and shoulders ache; she forced herself to stand and somehow made her way to the living room.

Brady had his hand around Dean's neck, and the kid stared back defiantly.

"You think this'll chance anything? That you're saving her?" Brady taunted.

Dean ignored him completely, choosing to train his almost-glare on Jessica. He glanced to the abandoned book by her feet and bat to her. Pick up the fucking book.

She did.

One of the pages had a yellow post it glued to it, a single sentence written in a messy scrawl 'Works on demons'. A chunk of the text was highlighted with yellow marker. Flicking her eyes to Dean one last time, she read.

"Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus, omnis satanica potestas, omnis incursio infernalis adversarii, omnis legio..."

Brady snapped his head towards her "Shut up!"

She didn't.

"... omnis congregatio et secta diabolica. Ergo draco maledicte-"

"If you don't shut the fuck up, I'll kill him! I'll snap his neck!"

Breath and Latin words caught in her throat. Dean's eyes widened "Keep going, Jessica!" he forced out "Don't stop or we're dead!"

Brady cut him short by tightening his fist and between the two, Jessica chose to believe Dean.

"et omnis legio diabolica adjuramus te. Cessa decipere humanas creaturas..." Brady growled and Dean's eyes started to roll to the back of his head. She read faster "... isque aeternae Perditionis venenum propinare." Dean stopped fighting altogether going limp "Humiliare sub potenti manu Dei-"

With another animalistic growl, Brady let Dean fall to the ground and aimed to tackle Jess, who stopped breathing. He ran into something before he got even close, an invisible wall that held him back.

It didn't make any sense – none of this did – but a new surge of hope made her boulder and she went on "contremisce et effuge, invocato a nobis sancto et terribili nomine, quem inferi tremunt."

A huge cloud of black smoke exploded from Brady's mouth and Jess shrieked and jumped back. When it was over, his body slumped down, like a puppet with no strings.

Then there was nothing.

Jessica fell to her knees and bawled like an infant, fresh tears flowing down her face without restraint.

She didn't even notice Dean until his hand touched her shoulder making her flinch.

"Come on…" he croaked and winced as he swallowed "You're hurt."

He picked her up in a fireman carry and took her to the car.

The drive passed in a blur of mumbled reassurances "You're okay" Dean would mumble in his scratchy, painful voice "I've got you." it shouldn't make her feel better. He was a kid. "I'm here." a kid with blood shot green eyes, and a hand shaped bruise on his neck "I'm so sorry… Please, hang on."

It shouldn't help. But it did.

She silently stretched her hand and curled their fingers together, giving him a tiny squeeze.

A watery relieved smile graced his face. "Nothing's gonna happen to you while I'm here."

When they arrived at the hospital, there was Dean again, picking her up like she weighted nothing. Throwing an arm around his neck, she nestled her head on his shoulder and gripped the fine hairs on the back of his head.

"Jessica" he rasped, his voice made her wince "They're gonna ask about what happened." her grip on his hair tightened; it must've hurt, he didn't show "If they ask, when they ask, we were attacked. This guy came in with Brady taking swings at us, totally messed up, we're thinking drugs or something. He stabbed you and tried to choke me. Brady took him down and we made a break for it, don't know what happened next. Do you understand me?"

Not really, no. Why would she say that? Brady tried to kill them. Brady was the one who swung a knife at her, not some other imaginary guy.

But there was that black smoke… It was evil, whatever it was, she was sure of it.

Could it be that Brady-

"Jess, please..." Dean stopped right before the glass doors, head bowed so that his cheek touched the top of her head "Please…" he begged in a tiny whisper that she felt rather than heard.

It broke her heart. "It's okay." she whispered back "I trust you." You saved my life.

He let out a shuddering breath "I'm so sorry." with his next step, the doors slid open automatically "Somebody help, please!"

The next thing she knew, there were different pairs of hands grabbing at her, prodding and poking and laying her on a gurney. Somehow, Dean managed to keep holding her hand reassuringly.

She looked up to see his bloodshot eyes staring intently at her, even if they seemed a little off. The nurses rolled her away, but she kept her fingers tangled with his until the last moment, reaching as far as she could.

Getting further and further away, she saw the twitchy way he turned his head to the remaining nurse beside him "Is she gonna be okay?"

"We'll take care of her." the nurse replied soothingly "You can relax now."

"Good." Dean mumbled "Good."

The last thing she saw before the swing doors closed were Dean's eyes rolling to the back of his head as he crumpled down.

"DEAN!"

A/N.: Well... Took me long enough, didn't it?

I do apologize, but at the same time, I kinda think this was the best chapter so far, but as usual, you guys will be the judged of that.

Thanks a lot to all of you who are still with me on this! I don't think this will be a very long story, but your support's been awsome!

Oh, and sorry if it's kind of repetitive, I'm just learning how incredibly small my english vocabulary is...