Route 666

"By the way, how does she know what we do?" Sam asked.

Dean glanced at Sam awkwardly.

"You told her? You told her the secret. Our big family rule number one we do what we do any we shut up about it! For a year and a half, I do nothing but lie to Jessica and you go out with this check in Ohio a couple a couple times, and you tell her everything?"

"Yeah, looks like..." Dean answered.

Sam huffed and looked out the window for a moment. He wasn't mad at Dean exactly, more frustrated at the idea that he had given up secrets so easily while Sam held them inside even after leaving the life.

"She noticed the salt once." Sam said.

"What salt?"

"For months after we moved in together, I couldn't shake the habit. I was still putting salt down by every window, I even checked the building for ghosts before we moved in. Couldn't take the hunter out of the boy I guess. Anyway, she caught me laying salt on the inside of the windowsill one day and asked me what the hell I was doing. I gave her some bullshit story about superstitions and family traditions."

Dean was quiet for a moment processing the story.

"What did she say to you?"

Sam chuckled softly and looked at his brother.

"Nothing, she watched me for a few seconds and then picked up the salt and finished salting the window."

Dean laughed.

"Seems like she a cool girl to put up with your weird ass."

"Yeah... probably could have told her the truth eventually... or at least kept salting the windows. I stopped at some point, I don't even remember when."

"Sammy... what happened is not your fault."

"I'm not looking for sympathy Dean... I guess what I am saying is I get okay? I get why you told her."

Dean didn't respond, he simply nodded his head and turned up AC/DC. He was glad Sam got it, because Dean didn't. It was stupid of him to open himself up like that.

Sam found it difficult to picture his brother living his own life. It wasn't that he didn't want that for Dean, but for the first eighteen years of his life the two brothers had been so intertwined. When Dean left it had never been for long and Sam always knew that at least Dean, if not their father, would always return to him. For the first time he felt a sick feeling in his stomach about his departure from his family. As he realized he had failed to give Dean the same comfort in return.

Sam glanced over at Dean who was pretending to sleep.

"Dean?"

Dean grunted to show Sam he was listening.

"If you ever do decide... you know... That you want to go... you should..."

"Go where exactly?"

"I don't know, I'm just saying you don't need to stay for me anymore."

Dean sat up with a groan and took off his sunglasses.

"What the hell are you talking about Sammy?"

Sam shrugged and stared out in the road in front of him.

"I'm just saying fair is fair. When the time comes for you to leave you should. Not like Dad and I didn't do it enough."

Dean blinked at the side of his brother's head.

"Pull over."

"I will at the next motel." Sam said.

"No Sam, pull the fuck over right now."

Sam veered off to the side of the road and watched as his brother got out, slamming the door behind him. Dean paced in front of the Impala, turning as he heard the driver's side door close. He looked at Sam trying to control his own frustration.

"Fair is fair? So what? You saying if I wake up tomorrow and decide to take off you would just be okay with that?"

"Of course not, I am just saying it's not my place to stop you."

Dean watched as Sam dug his foot into the gravel on the side of the road, hiding his eyes behind his long bangs. The frustration drained out of him as he recognized what this was. It was guilt.

"Look...you remember when I said Cassie was finishing up college?" Dean asked.

"Yeah? What about it?"

"I met her just after I left you at Stanford... after that stupid fight we had. I met Cassie at a bar, we hung out in her dorm room and went to college parties. I enjoyed being around her, but when I looked around at all those college kids? I saw a million Sam's and no Dean's. I wasn't made for that life, but you were. It was the first time I realized that it was okay that you were changing. That it was okay that you weren't the same as Dad and me. You don't owe me a get out of jail free card for wanting to live your own life. Got it?"

Sam swallowed and leaned back against the front of the Impala.

"You really don't want anything more than this life?" Sam asked.

Dean sighed and sat down beside his brother. The truth? Of course he did. If he knew that the thing that killed his mother was gone, and that the world was safe from monsters? He would hang it up. But that was an impossible dream, he was faced with his own reality.

"I think the part of me who would have wanted a white picket fence died in Lawrence Sammy."

"It's never too late." Sam whispered.

Dean thought back to that small diamond ring that he had found in Sam's bag and thought about his brother living in a house on a quiet street with Jessica and a couple of kids. He couldn't see himself living next door or anything but maybe he could swing into town sometimes, keeping the town safe from everything, then went bump in the night. Keeping Sammy safe.

Dean may not be able to see himself with that life, but he still hoped that someday... he would be able to give it to his brother.

Dean smirked at his brother.

"Well for now. We've got work to do."