Three days later and she was allowed visitors other than her two brothers, Kate had her own room and was surrounded by her family. She'd come to the conclusion she would have to change careers, except she had no idea what to do and she had a gig in six weeks, that she swore she would make. Her morphine dosage was lower she was much more lucid. Dean had already found out that his walking out of the studio had pissed his manager off despite the very good reason and he'd been released from his label, it didn't really bother him, he was a free agent now. Although he had an idea about what to do with his time now.

"So what's the prognosis doc? Will I be doing the show in six weeks?" Kate asked, sounding very methodical.

"I doubt it. Your tibia break may be healed by then, it's the femoral break we're worried about. If you're lucky it may take up to twelve weeks, but it could be even longer. I suggest you postpone your show." The doctor replied.

"I can't postpone, it's a charity show, I have to be there! It's just ten minutes!" Kate lost her cool and was distressed. She looked at her brother who knew how much this show meant to her, she had set up this charity to help the families of people with PTSD after seeing how it had affected her family when it had happened to her father. She would never say the real reason why she started the charity until John wasn't around to feel ashamed as he no doubt would even if he wasn't to feel like that.

"Katie, you can play the guitar sat down right?" Dean said suddenly, he's had time to calm himself and was ready to start to help his sister in any way that she needed and that included being her support during her physio sessions that was no doubt going to be having.

"Yeah, of course." She sounded unsure and was confused at what Dean was getting at.

"If you can't handle being your feet for too long by then, you can do your set sat down. You won't let the charity down, you never could. Six weeks, six weeks and we'll see." Dean offered with a smile, he was always her knight in shining armour. Most people say their partners save them from themselves and for must people they do, but for Kate it was her big brother. She owed so much to him, he got her out of trouble whenever she'd flipped out at someone for saying shit about her family, her dad was a hero and her brothers were amazing. She saw the sense in his plan and agreed that it would work. She had hope now and that was all it would take for her to heal. After talking Kate hrough the options about her physio sessions the doctor left leaving her alone with her family and that was the point where the trouble would brew. Kate was always butting heads with her father, she was too much like her mother not to be able to irritate her father.

"Why didn't you have them call me Katherine?" John asked and Dean sighe, they just couldn't wait to have an argument could they? It was always Kate who rubbed him up the wrong way, when she fell pregnant out of wedlock, he'd flipped out at her. Nothing she ever did seemed good enough for her father, but ever since Kate's sixteenth birthday and she got the motorcycle she had become difficult and it was usually only Dean who could control her.

"Dad, you have enough to deal with, without worrying about calling your kids and their families, getting here and worrying about me. I knew Dean could handle it, he's been handling a lot since the incident and remember how you were when you found out about the fire seven years ago? I do, you were nearly crazy dad, I refused to send you back to that point." Kate argued, she realized it would have sounded like a criticism of John, but it wasn't. She knew he was a good father when he could cope, but when he couldn't he still managed except sometimes he would need his eldest to get him to take his medication when he wouldn't go to see his therapist. It always seemed that when John was dealing with it and getting better, he'd suddenly relapse and they had to be careful around him. He'd relapsed when the fire had erupted at Sam's Palo Alto apartment killing Sam's wife seven years previously.

"You're blaming me?" John hissed as Sam slipped out to avoid the confrontation, he was a painfully shy young man and perhaps that was why he had never had a successful date over the years and as for the sex? He was on a serious dry spell, Dean kept joking that one day Sam would be a born again virgin.

"No I'm not, I'm just saying you couldn't cope and I know why. Dean has coped and he can cope and that's the thing dad, I didn't want to be responsible for making you unable to deal with your life. All I try to do for you, is to make it easier without stress for you." Kate sighed and suddenly Dean realized, she really did know how bad her father was, even before he'd blurted it out after his last show. She was trying to help in her own way. She wasn't trying to push her dad out, she was trying to save him. John saw that too, of course it was tense, but everyone could see how much she loved her family even if she fought with them all the time and made it seem as if she didn't want to know then when things were bad. It cut her like a knife to see her childhood hero so disheartened and she just wanted her daddy back.

"You've been trying to protect dad all these years?" Dean asked making sure he was hearing this correctly.

"Yeah, you raised two difficult teenagers Dean so dad didn't have to. You helped him cope and I kept my life separate from dad so he didn't relapse. I was scared that he'd relapse and sometimes he has and it's scared me." She nodded allowing them to see into her life for the first time in more than a decade. It wouldn't heal the rift that had been made, but it would surely help.

Sam sat out in the corridor waiting for the argument to be over; he had always hated arguments once he went to college. He still remembered the night of the fire; they'd fought that day and had gone to bed angry at each other, he couldn't help but wonder if Jess knew he still loved her and that he was sorry for the fight. He was so lost in his thoughts that he didn't hear anyone come and sit beside him.

"It's Sam isn't it?" Anna smiled watching him. She'd just finished her shift and she was intrigued by Sam, he was a quiet soul unlike his siblings who were rather loud and liked to be heard. His was a soul that had been touched by sorrow and grief.

"Erm, yeah. How does it look for her? I know the doctor says she may not be walking properly for a few months, but be honest with me please." Sam begged, he looked so broken that Anna just wanted to protect him.

"The walking is the main problem, she has no other lasting damage and despite hitting her head she doesn't have any brain damage. She'll be fine, I have a feeling she's stubborn enough to surprise everyone." Anna smiled especially when Sam cracked a smile.

"She was always the stubborn one of the family, she's worse than Dad. She reminds me a lot of Jess with her stubbornness." Sam chuckled, his voice sounding a little hollow around the name of this mysterious Jess. Anna got up and pulled him up with her extraordinary strength.

"Coffee, you need it. Have you even slept in the last three days?" She asked him as she almost dragged him to the canteen for some decent coffee and not the caffeine from the machine, which was actually an insult to caffeine.

"Maybe a few hours here and there. Katie's sick of the sight of me by now." Sam shrugged as he let her pull him to the canteen where he ended up drinking his coffee like Dean did and it was odd for him to do that without thinking, normally he liked some foam and a latte.

"She appreciates you being here. She just wishes you'd get some sleep before you end up in the room next to hers." Anna corrected him with a smile. There was something that drew her to Sam, it was strange. He was handsome and tall, but there was unspoken tragedy that made him so delicate. She promised herself that by the time Kate was discharged she'd make a friend out of Sam.

"If only that were true Nurse Milton." Sam sighed as he sipped the strong coffee.