Maybe she's still making up for lost time. Maybe she's still exhausted after so long and so little rest. But the next thing Lizzy knows is she feels small hands on her cheeks as she wakes up. This time she takes it slow, not freaking out over the jarring change. Instead she thinks about it. Small, tiny, gentle hands pressing her cheeks together and squishing her lips until they're pursed don't really set off alarms for her.

Instead she tries to smile as her eyes open to find Sammy hovering over her, his face in a wide, toothy grin.

"You fishy, mommy!" he says with pure, wide-awake delight. He then giggles and the sound hits her right in the heart.

"I'm a fishy?" she gets out while her face is still smushed.

Sammy just collapses in laughter when she speaks like that, falling onto his side and letting her face go.

"Oh, that's funny?" Lizzy asks, hands aiming right at his little tummy. She starts to tickle him just to make sure the beautiful sound of his laughter continues.

It works. Sammy's giggles makes her terrible current situation disappear.

She spent the night in Sammy's room. After he woke up to his family yelling at each other, she brought him back to his room and read to him. He fell asleep halfway through Cool Cars and once he was out she didn't have it in her to leave him. Dean sat with her on Sammy's bed as they quietly discussed what to do with their current mess. Can they do this? What happens with Sammy now? They can't just let Kevin suffer. They know they have to find him but can they trust Lou and Sam to get the job done?

Everything felt so heavy after last night's revelations. She's shocked she even got any sleep at all.

But this wake up call, the one with a smiling little boy that has no idea about the world around him being a horror show, makes everything disappear.

"I can't believe I fell asleep, dude," Lizzy says with a smile when she lets up on the tickling. "Hope you don't mind I stole your bed."

"It okay , mommy," Sammy says sitting up tall. Lizzy pats down his bed head as he looks at her. "I hungry."

"You're hungry?"

"Yeah."

"Well, I'm thinking it's a cereal and fruit day," Lizzy tries, hoping she's right.

"Pancakes!" Sammy shouts instead.

"Oh no. We did pancakes yesterday," Lizzy tries to turn the request around. "We should do something healthier today. We can do Lucky Charms and bananas."

Sammy sits there, contemplating, before shrugging. "Okay."

"Oh my god, you're so easy sometimes," Lizzy tells him happily, pulling him into her lap and kissing his cheek. "Something you don't get from your daddy."

"I like daddy is?" Sammy asks, always so interested in the idea of being like his own father.

"Too much, sweetie." Lizzy picks him up despite his obvious ability to walk and be able to move on his own. Sometimes holding him just feels too good still. She just can't get enough of this little guy just yet.

They head out of the bedroom to find a full first floor. Sam sits at the table with his laptop out and some earbuds in, Lou is taking notes while listening to some messages from her own old phone, and Dean's shaking out his wet hair after a shower, just now rejoining the room.

"Hey, dude," Dean greets with wide eyes, undoubtedly trying to look awake despite clearly having been up all night. He kisses Sammy's forehead as Lizzy holds him. "You sleep tight?"

"No bed bugs, daddy," Sammy tells him factually before he spies Lou on the couch. He freaks out. "Auntie Louie!"

"Hey, babe," Lou jokes as she watches him scramble out of Lizzy's arms. Lizzy lets him down and Sammy bolts for her after having missed her for so long. He gives her a massive hug as Lou hauls him into her lap. "How you doing, smelly?"

"Good," Sammy says to her, settling into her hold like it's the most normal thing. "Mommy here."

"I know," Lou smiles, still happy to see her sister alive and well… even if she's pissed.

"Mommy nice. I like her. She make me Mickey pancakes and she reads with funny voices like daddy do it."

"Well, it sounds like mommy's awesome," Lou tells him, avoiding eye contact with Lizzy at all costs to keep the peace.

"Sweetie, you wanna eat?" Lizzy asks, pulling a bowl from the cupboard and grabbing the Lucky Charms.

"Yeah," Sammy answers, getting off Lou and running to the table. He sees Sam sitting there. "Hi Uncle Sam!"

"Hey!" Sam grins wider than he can remember grinning in a long time when he catches his nephew running for him. He immediately pulls the earbuds out of his ear to focus on the kid. "How's it going?"

"Good," Sammy answers as he scrambles up onto Sam now, the man helping after a moment.

"You behaving?" Sam checks on him, making sure he's been on point.

"Yes."

"That's good," Sam says to him, patting down his bed head. "Looks like you slept well."

"Yeah. I eatin' Charms for breakfast," Sammy tells him.

"Sounds yummy," Sam says to him, not even registering the lame words he chooses to use these days. It's second nature now.

Lizzy places a bowl of cereal and milk in front of Sammy, handing him a spoon. She doesn't speak to Sam at this point but it's clear she wants her son to have her family with him and not make it tension-filled for the boy. Sam's very grateful for that.

Without asking, Sammy picks out the perfect marshmallow and looks up. He presses the marshmallow to Sam's lips until he eats it. "Thanks."

"Welcome," Sammy says before digging into his bowl with a spoon fisted in his small hand.

Sam can't help but smile a little.

"Here," Lizzy makes sure to remind Sammy that the cut up half banana on a plate is there. He needs to get his fruit in.

"Thank you, mommy," Sammy says with a mouthful, a little dribble of milk spilling down his chin.

"Cute," Lizzy winks and wipes the milk with her thumb before pouring herself a bowl. She looks to Dean as he finishes setting up a new pot of coffee to brew. "You in?"

"Definitely," she grins lightly at her. Even if shit is about to go very poorly at least their unit of three is strong and happy.

She pours two bowls all while Sammy eats and shares a marshmallow with Sam every now and then.

"Hey, listen to this," Sam suddenly says, unplugging the earbuds from the laptop to let everyone listen. "Kevin's last message. Listen to the background."

He plays it.

"What is it?" Dean asks from his spot leaning on the counter, mouth full of cereal.

"I think he was on a bus," Sam tells them, pulling up an isolated clip on his laptop. "Listen again." He nods at Lou as she walks over, wanting her in on this.

In the vague background they can just make out an announcement on a loud speaker over the sounds of busses shifting gears.

Last stop: Centreville.

"Centreville where?" Dean asks, another massive bit of Charms in his way. "There's gotta be a million."

"Michigan," Sam answers with certainty.

"How can you be sure?" Lou wonders, knowing he has an answer.

Sam turns his laptop towards her, a social media page of a girl up on it. "Because… his high school girlfriend goes to school there."

Channing Ngo looks back at Lou and she smiles slightly. A cold trail from a year ago and her man can still figure it out so easily.

"That's thin," Dean comments, glancing at Lizzy and noticing that she's incredibly quiet at the moment. She hasn't added or commented on a single thing from Sam's research.

"No way. It's his girl," Lou says easily. "Kevin's a good kid. He's probably at least checking out that she's alright."

"And it's the best lead we got," Sam makes sure Dean understands. They've been up all night. This is all they have.

"We?" Dean asks, surprised by the wording.

Sam nods, looking back to his laptop as Lou slides it back to him across the table. "He was our responsibility. Maybe a year ago we had hyper focused on keeping this family together but… we should have thought more about him. So… we'll find him, okay?"

Dean's eyebrows fly to his hairline with that. "Awfully sudden change of heart."

"We talked," Lou speaks up, knowing Sam shouldn't take his brother's fire on his own. "When you and Lizzy were reading to Sammy we… realized you guys were right. We focused too much on ourselves and this poor kid has been on his own, hiding from the friggin' King of Hell on his own. That's not fair. We royally screwed up."

Dean catches the slight reaction on Lizzy face as she stares into her cereal bowl. He's clearly not the only surprised one in the room.

"We should pack up," Sam says to Lou and she nods in agreement. They both stand up. "You have any kind of arsenal still here?"

Dean nods. "Basement is still stocked."

"Alright," Sam solemnly accepts and he and Lou both head to the basement.

"Wait!" Lizzy calls out to them and they both pause, turn to look at her. "What's the plan here?"

Sam and Lou glance at each other, something they do a lot these days. "We head out and find Kevin. Bring him back here."

"What about us?" Dean jumps in, knowing what Lizzy's asking.

"Stay here," Lou says. "Neither of you screwed the honor student on this one. We owe him. And you guys need more time as a family. You deserve that much." She shrug and disappears into the basement, Sam following.

Lizzy then looks up at Dean as he rinses his empty bowl in the sink. "So… we just stay here?"

"Do you feel ready to go hunting down a prophet with Crowley out there probably also looking for him?"

One look at her son and his milk-dribbled chin and she knows the answer. "Not at all."

"Then we let them handle it," Dean tells her easily, pouring himself and her each a mug of coffee now that it's brewed.

"Just like that?" Lizzy wonders.

"Yeah," Dean shrugs, pouring milk into her mug.

Lizzy shakes her head. "Since when are you all cool with them hunting alone without your expert ass backing them up?"

"Mommy, you no say that," Sammy doles out a warning for her.

"Crap," she whispers to herself. "Sorry, kiddo. I know I shouldn't say that. I meant bum." She forgets that he's old enough to hear all that she says these days. He's smart and she needs to catch up to that.

"Daddy say bad words too. I tell him no," Sammy proudly says, knowing that certain words that adults sometimes say aren't appropriate.

"That's because you're a good kid," Lizzy smiles, ruffling his head. She turns back to Dean as he places both mugs on the table and sits next to her. She raises her eyebrows for an answer.

"Look, this past year was… different," he tries to explain. "And when it came down to it, I was all Sammy had left. He was already down one parent and I couldn't leave him. So, I was done. Whenever Sam and Lou found something that needed taking care of they went and I didn't. I took bar duty for Lou and Sammy hung out with me. That was it. I got used to them just taking care of things."

Lizzy stares at him with shock. When she left he was impossible. The very idea of Sam ever heading out without his big brother, even with Lou as back up, made him itchy and uncomfortable to a very high level. But now he's very okay with it.

"I don't even know you anymore," Lizzy jokes within their situation as she takes a sip of her coffee.

"Is that you asking to get to know me all over again?" Dean smirks at her, looking for another meaning to his words. "Because if that's what you want, I wouldn't mind letting you get reacquainted with this." He nods to his form.

"Not in front of the child, dear," she jokes back and playfully swats his shoulder. It feels good to have the chance to joke with him again, be relaxed with one another, and feel the love and ease of their relationship again. She just gives him a sweet, loving look, one he mirrors right back. They're doing well, better than she's hoped by this point. "You're so different."

"Am I?" Dean asks. She nods the affirmative. "Don't feel different."

"You are," she smiles and nods. "I like it. A lot."

Dean makes a face of pleasant acceptance. "Well… alright then."

They look at each other over their mugs, grinning like teenagers, when they hear footsteps coming back up the stairs to ruin the moment.

"Alright, you guys sit tight," Sam says to them, a large duffle over his shoulder and Lou following close behind. "We'll call with updates."

"And when we get back we'll have a prophet in tow," Lou promises.

"You better," Dean says without the threatening edge in his tone. He's just simply worried about Kevin. He was never made for this world and the fact that he's been on his own for so long? It's frightening. "Call if you need anything."

"Will do," Sam nods.

And that's when it clicks for Sammy. "You leavin'?" his saddened tone asks from behind his now empty bowl at the table.

"Yeah, bud," Sam nods. "I know we just got here but we have to go help a friend out."

At the word friend Lizzy snorts a disgusted laugh. Sam chooses to ignore it.

"You leavin'," Sammy repeats without the question, his chin quivering right away as his eyes water over.

"Oh… dude," Sam starts to melt, the look on his nephew's face over his leaving just killing him. Sam drops his duffle bag and moves quickly to the little guy. "It's alright, Sammy." He picks up the now crying little boy, hugging him in tightly. "I know, we missed you too. A whole lot."

Sammy just sniffles over his shoulder, his head pressed to Sam with his little heart aching.

As Sam tries to assure Sammy, Lizzy sits there in her realizations. Her family was there for her son completely and without question while she was gone. Sammy loves his family deeply and he needs them, not just mom and dad but uncle and aunt too. And now, with the tension in the group along with the dangerous task at hand, Sam and Lou are leaving him. Again.

"Miss you, Uncle Sam," Sammy tells him with one fist in Sam's shirt and the other in his way too long hair. "You stay here."

Sam rolls his eyes to the ceiling and blinks rapidly, his chest painful with the little request. "I know, Sammy. I know. It's confusing. But I'll be back. Lou and I, we'll be right back. We have to go help someone. They need us."

"Need you?" Sammy asks, voice watery and nose sniffling again.

"Yeah. We have a friend that needs Auntie Lou and me to help him. When we're done we'll come right back here, okay? I promise."

"You promise," Sammy says in as strong a voice as he can manage.

"Of course," Sam says and moves Sammy away from his shoulder to look him in the eyes. "You gonna be tough until we get back?"

"Yeah," Sammy says, calming down as he wipes his eyes clumsily with his hands. "I big guy."

"You are a big guy, aren't you?" Sam asks with a smile. "We gotta go. Say bye to Lou."

Sam leans Sammy over to Lou at his side and Sammy gives her a peck on the lips, his little arm around her neck.

"Well see you soon, crazy," Lou says to her nephew as she tries her hardest to remain tough within his so sad state. She rubs his back as they hug for a second. "Will you sing with me when I get back?"

"We do mommy's song?" Sammy asks, Lizzy's eyes darting over to them sharply with the mention.

"Absolutely," Lou nods, seeing Lizzy's piqued interest in her periphery. "We'll even let mommy listen."

"Okay," Sammy's down tone agrees.

"We'll see you in a few days, huh?" Sam says to Sammy as he straightens up with him.

The little boy reaches up and squeezes Sam's cheeks together just like he did to his mother that very morning. In a still sad voice, Sammy says, "You fishy."

Sam can't help but laugh a little at how hard Sammy' trying to be brave. He opens and closes his pursed lips a few times. "You gonna say bye to me?"

Sammy kisses his uncle's fish lips before he hugs him as hard are his little two-year-old arms can handle.

"Love you, buddy," Sam tells his nephew, eyes closed as he takes in the moment. He truly missed this little guy while he was gone for a week.

"Love you, Uncle Sam," Sammy says before Sam puts him back down in his seat.

Sam reaches for a banana slice and eats it.

"Hey!" Sammy says, never cool when people take his food.

"Hey yourself," Sam ruffles his hair before picking up his duffle. "You behave," he points at his nephew.

"Okay," Sammy answers, his voice still low.

"Bye, crazy," Lou says to him and when they reach the door, Sam leaving first, Lou turns around and blows him a kiss. Sammy does the same and the door closes.

Lizzy watches her son slump his back and lean his face into his fist. Propped up by an elbow, his cheek squished, Sammy sighs almost comically.

"Dude, it's okay," Dean reminds him. "They'll be back real soon, you heard Sam."

"Yeah," Sammy answers without any real excitement.

"You wanna play with cars?" Dean asks, knowing when things don't go well that Sammy can just play with his cars and get past it after a little bit.

"Okay," Sammy says and climbs down from his chair. "I play cars now."

His dragging, miserable form makes its way over to the corner of the cabin he's claimed. He plops down on the floor and starts to pull apart the attachable pieces of road to rearrange them in a new pattern.

"Shit, he really loves his aunt and uncle, huh?" Lizzy asks, watching her sad little guy move around without the excitement he's had the entire time Lizzy's been around him.

"You wouldn't believe it," Dean answers with pure certainty. "They've been a constant. And they're really good with him. Maybe too good."

"What's that mean?" she wonders.

"It means… I worried about Sammy getting too close to them and… forgetting you sometimes…."

Two months in and Dean's not any better than when it just happened. His eyes are hollow with bags under them and he's thinner than ever. Despite his claims of being 'fine', Sam and Lou don't buy it for a second. They knew how hard this would be.

"Come on, Sammy," Lou says, picking him up from the playpen in the house they've recently moved into. Dean watches her move, pulling the now fourteen month old onto her hip and walking for the open kitchen. He's watched every move Lou and Sam have made since Lizzy died, especially concerning Sammy, and maybe that's why he's wallowing in his grief so damn much. Sammy is well cared for. He can mope and be depressed.

Rummaging through the cupboard, Lou grabs a couple jars.

"Alright, so… peas and carrots or beef and veggies?" she asks the boy, the noises he's making sounding more and more like words these days. He has a few down, of course, but he's still learning.

Dean closes his eyes and leans the back of his head onto the back of the couch. He's always exhausted these days. Being a depressed disaster isn't easy. And the ache in his heart… it just won't dull down.

"Beef and veggies!" Lou says in a louder voice, making it a happy moment even if it's so mundane. She sets everything up, getting Sammy in his highchair and popping open the baby food jar, and as she grabs a spoon she looks over to Dean on the couch. "Dean, you wanna do the honors?"

He sighs. "Nah. Go ahead," he answers without any desire in his tone.

"Of course," Lou mutters to herself, angry. Dean can't pop out of his misery but in the meantime she's sacrificed her own mourning in order to raise Dean's child. She's getting tired of it.

But when she looks at Sammy' face, happy and unaware of the pain all around him, she grins. He's a good boy. Maybe this is the least she can do for Lizzy while she's gone.

"Open up, crazy man," Lou says to him as she scoops a spoonful of the brown mush. Sammy, used to this routine by now, opens wide and lets Lou feed him the scoop. He eats the food with minimal dribble-age. "Getting way better at this, Sammy boy."

They proceed to get about halfway through before Sammy manages to grab one spoonful and get it all over his little hand.

"Oh no! What did you do!?" Lou asks in an overly silly voice. Sammy's minimal teeth show with a brilliant smile at her silliness. "Ok, let's clean that hand up."

Grabbing a wipe from the package on the table she starts to clean his hand.

"Ma!" he calls out to her. "Ma-ma! Ma! Ma!"

Lou's breath gets caught in her throat. Ma? Really?

When she glances over at Dean she can see his face staring at her with pure upset. It quickly morphs to fury as he stands up, the realization hitting him too hard.

"Dean… I didn't… I…." Lou can't speak. She has no idea what to even say to the man after his son called the wrong woman mom. It's nothing she intended but it just happened.

"I got it," Dean says, snatching the baby food jar out of her hands and standing there, waiting for her to move out of the seat so he can take over.

"He doesn't understand…."

"I got it," he repeats, much harsher this time.

Lou understands that this is not a time to argue or make a point. She stands up and moves, Dean taking her seat. She leaves the room when she feels too awkward to do anything else but she makes it to the stairs that lead to the second floor and stops. Dean's been a mess and she just wants to make sure he's alright in there alone. She takes a seat on the bottom step and listens closely.

"Here," Dean says to Sammy, scooping more beef and veggie for him. Sammy dutifully eats and looks up at his daddy with wide eyes. "She's not your mom."

Lou closes her eyes. She never meant to try and take Lizzy's place. She's just doing what she can to help.

"Your Auntie Lou is good people but she's not your mom. She'll never be your mom," Dean keeps talking, using every ounce of energy he has in his body to do the menial task at hand. "Your mom…."

She could hear his voice crack from the stairs.

"Your mom was everything," Dean tells Sammy. "Don't you forget that. No one compares to her."

After that Lou makes her way up the stairs to lay down in bed alone. She needed a moment.

"She didn't think I could hear her but she's not exactly quiet sometimes," Dean comments, both still watching Sammy. "The second he called her mom… that changed everything. I realized I couldn't let Lou and Sam take the burden of raising him. And I didn't ever want him thinking Lou was his mother. The thought that he'd forget you… or never know about you… I couldn't live with that."

Lizzy sits there, thinking. She knows how mad she is right now, how utterly let down she is that her own sister and brother-in-law would not only lie to Dean about where she was but, even worse, let a poor, defenseless kid get swept up in Crowley's evil bullshit. But… they're also Sammy's family. And it's clear to her now that over the last year they've been so much to her boy. They raised him and they love him so strongly. She can't take that away from Sammy.

But how does she handle the betrayal while allowing them around Sammy at the same time?

Leaning back in her seat, Lizzy sighs. "This whole thing sucks ass."

Dean just looks at her, sipping his morning coffee and letting the sentiment hang in the air a moment. "It does."

She huffs a disgusted laugh with it all.

"But, bright side, we have more time together," Dean points out. "They're cleaning up the Kevin mess they made and we… have time."

Lizzy actually laughs a little at that. "Have we ever had time before?"

"Can't remember," Dean scrunches his face. "What do you wanna do with it?"

Lizzy's eyes slide over to her sad son, his feelings so hurt that his aunt and uncle left without spending real time with him. He clearly misses them and needs to be cheered up.

"What does he like to do?" Lizzy wonders, looking for a family day.

Dean shrugs. "Anything. We've gone to the movies, parks, diners… hell, even a petting zoo once…."

"Petting zoo?" Lizzy asks, looking at him with hope.

"Uh, yeah. He really dug it. Why?" Dean questions face wrinkled.

"He likes animals then?" Lizzy checks with him.

"Yeah…."

"Hm," she hums out, getting up to grab Dean's laptop from where it was abandoned on the coffee table. She then comes back to the kitchen table and fires it up.

"What are you thinking?" Dean has to wonder.

"How good is he in the car?" Lizzy wonders, typing in the obvious password she just assumes he never changed. It's been the same since before they'd met. BustyAsianBeauties.

"By now? Great."

"And he doesn't mind sleeping away from home, or part time home?"

"He's fine… what are you getting at here?" Dean wonders as he drops his mug and stands behind her chair, watching her type in a name in the search bar of Google.

"I passed a sign for this place on the way here," she explains, opening the webpage. When she looks up at him for a reaction to her idea as he checks out the screen she sees him smiling. "Oh good. I'm on the right track."

"We travel today… go tomorrow?" Dean wonders, already thinking ahead like the true road warrior he is.

"That was the plan," Lizzy nods.

"I'll go pack us up," Dean tells her, leans down to press a kiss to her cheek before disappearing into Sammy's room.