Dean swung Baby around a wide turn and listened to the loud rumble of her engine. He loved her so. He loved the way she responded to him, how her feel was so familiar, so welcome. How intimate he was with the way she moved, micro-adjustments of pedal and steering came to him without thinking. It was a language he spoke that came as natural to him as breathing. She spoke it with him. It was something that only they knew. Their own private code.

Sometimes when something was bothering him, he'd take Baby out and drive aimlessly to clear his mind. The miles rolled by them as Baby opened up on an old back road. He'd have to head back soon to get Sam, but for the moment, it was Dean and his Baby. Dean didn't understand why the memories of the demon were still bothering him. He had so much worse happen in his young life. Hell, he'd had men get handsy with him at bars. One didn't look like Dean Winchester did in his teens and frequent the types of places his dad took him without having some unpleasant exchanges. Dean had always popped someone in the mouth and it was over with. No harm, no foul. He never gave it a second thought. Not even once.

But this... this somehow bothered him. This had crawled into his psyche and stayed there. Which, he supposed, is exactly what the demon wanted. I'm trying to get into the cracks of your psyche and play there. Play there until I force those cracks to widen. A knee forcing his thighs open, his heart suddenly hammering wildly in his chest. Pinned down. Unable to move. Some part of him terrified, violated. Another responding to her touches the way he always did with an attractive woman.

Broken. He was broken. She knew it. Hell, Sam knew it. He could feel his palms start to sweat on the steering wheel. He wished that Baby could take him away from himself sometimes. Sometimes she did when he got lost in the feel of the '67 Impala on the open road.

Cracks in his foundation.

Poor simple Dean.

Simple Dean. He wasn't smart like Sammy. He knew he wasn't smart like Sam. Sometimes he felt like a moron as Sam read, synthesized, and digested information before he had a chance to comprehend a sentence of it. All Dean recalled was constantly being the new kid at school. He showed up having missed so much of the year, having missed so much of the varying curriculum from state-to-state that he eventually tuned out what was being taught. Until his father pulled him aside and made him memorize his multiplication tables. Which, of course, Sam, four years his junior, learned by osmosis observing his older brother while Dean sat frustrated writing out equations again and again.

Dean could take apart and rebuild anything. He was glib and quick on his feet. But smart? He didn't think so, even if some part of his mind insisted that he was- even as select teachers had told him he was clever but he didn't apply himself. Even as he heard Bobby say, "You're too dumb to know how smart you are, you idjit!" Dean's lip curled up into a half smile at the memory.

Cracks in his foundation. The ceilings, the walls, until nothing is stable, until one day-it just falls. Crumbles. Is that what was bound to happen to him? Would he eventually topple over from stress like poorly stacked Lincoln Logs? Even now it felt like some days he was barely holding it together. He missed his father. He felt abandoned, betrayed even though he knew. He knew whatever reason Dad disappeared for was a good one. Was what had to be done. He knew it. But he was still scared. Still felt like he had the responsibility to hold Sammy together. Still felt like he had no clue what they were doing. Still felt like a shitty imitation of a hunter-him and Sam just fucking winging it day after day. Pretending to have a fucking clue. Any fucking clue whatsoever. Getting hurt more often than not from their sheer inexperience.

But he was Dean Winchester. He was as solid as a brick house... with a cracked foundation.

Faults. Crumbling. A foundation that would shift overtime...it already had. Already he felt less sure of himself, less steady than he had just a few months ago. Having Sammy back with him felt right but so much else felt wrong. Here he was coming half unglued over being fondled by a woman he would have slept with in a minute if circumstances had been different. It was pathetic. He was sweating for god's sake.

How did she know much so much about him? Was he that transparent? Or were all his scars on display for the world to see? Did demons have mind-reading abilities? Had this one been following them without him knowing it? He didn't know which possibility was more disturbing. They all upset him slightly.

He and Sam had spent the better part of a week trying to track her back down, but she was gone. Disappeared into the ether. Just like the other demons.

The house burning. Mom gone. 'Save Sammy.' Jessica burning. The images came in rapid succession. A demon following him. Dad missing. It felt overwhelming suddenly.

He opened Baby up, felt her respond beneath him like a thoroughbred let out of the starting gate. He missed his father deeply. Achingly. He had no one to share his grief with. Sam didn't understand, didn't share the same bond. Never had. Never would.

It made him feel sorry for his brother. Dean had had his mother for however short a time and he'd had Dad too.

Sammy. Sammy had neither, really. He'd driven Dad away, created a rift so deep it could never be bridged and Mom was gone before he'd even had a memory of her. Sam had Dean. That was it. Dean was keenly aware of it- as he always had been. Though whether or not Sam was-he didn't know.

Your brother has one weakness-you. But you, Dean. Oh there are so many cracks in your foundation its hard to know where to begin.

Baby ate the miles and before Dean realized it, he'd been driving for an hour. He needed to turn around to get Sam. He pulled the Impala into a small dirt turnaround spot, just off the shoulder of the asphalt and cut the engine. She sat there in a cloud of dust and Dean swung the door open. He looked out at the scenery. Miles of country nothingness, flat, brown. He stood up, stretched his legs and back. He liked the solitude. It felt good to be alone. "Just you and me, Baby." He leaned his back against the door and tucked his hands into the pockets of his worn blue jeans. The breeze ruffled his hair and set his brass amulet swinging. He squinted against the wind and took a deep breath.

TBC...

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