I spend the rest of the day resting under Ruby's orders and watchful eye, but really what I do is pace frantically around the room until Ruby finally agrees to letting me take a walk outside unsupervised. She caves around two-thirty in the afternoon, and I slam the door behind me viciously.

As soon as I'm outside, I take a deep breath. The air feels different, cleaner, freer, fresher than it has all week, all summer maybe, and I chalk it up to fall rolling in, but I know in my heart that it's something else.

The walk I take at two-thirty in the afternoon that day is the first time I feel truly peaceful since Dean died. There's probably a hundred demons in town all working for Lilith, all willing to disobey her orders if they get to kill me themselves, and I just don't care. It's not the reckless kind of not caring either. I just feel, for really no reason at all, like there's something really worth fighting for here, like all the pieces of me that got ripped up right alongside Dean four months ago are finally getting glued back together. It's not the demon blood, or the hunting. I just feel good.

When I've been walking for about an hour, I think about Dean, and I think about visiting his grave, but a wave of grief washes over me, so I don't go, even though I really want to. I miss Dean a lot, and I want to be close to him, and this fighting for vengeance thing isn't really cutting it, but I guess I don't feel as good as I thought.

I go back to the room at four-thirty in the afternoon without visiting Dean.

On the way back to hotel, I make up mind, and I tell Ruby the moment I open the door. "I'm going to visit Dean tomorrow," I announce.

"Why didn't you go while you were out?" Ruby asks. I look down and I think Ruby gets it, maybe even a little better than I do because she says, "Do you want me to come with you?"

I shake my head. "No," I say. "No offense, Ruby, but Dean's doesn't exactly like you."

"Why would I be offended?" she asks, feigning something like surprise, and I know Ruby will hang back when I go talk to Dean. "We'll swing by on our way out of town. I'll wait in the car and everything."

"Wait, Ruby," I say suddenly. "I was wondering if we could stay for a few more days."

Ruby gives me a look like she's trying to figure out whether I'm playing some sort of angle, but in the end, she just smiles victoriously. "Are you ready to hunt?"

"Yeah."

Ruby's smile grows. "Let's order a pizza."

There's a knock at the door at five-thirty and I hear Ruby giving the poor guy lip, so I go over to help, because sometimes I forget, but Ruby's still a demon.

I turn the corner out of the bedroom to save some poor teenager from Ruby's wrath, and stop dead in my tracks and mid-sentence because there are two faces and no pizza and a sudden rush of blood in my ears, so loud and so fast, I'm pretty sure I'm going to faint.

One of the faces is Bobby's, and he looks how I left him, sad and concerned and the last person on earth I wanted to see. I sneak a glance at Ruby and see a smirk playing on her lips before I force myself to look at the other face staring at me. He's got wide, hopeful, green eyes, and he's looking me over with such graceless familiarity that it can't be anyone but him.

But I can't believe it.

Everything just stops. Ruby and Bobby and the TV in the back of the room disappear. There's nothing, not even the hotel, but me and him as we look each other over like it's the last thing we're ever going to do. I wish he would break the silence because I can't believe it's him, and if I do it, then the world will shatter, but I'm holding my breath, and honestly, I don't know how long I'm going to last like this.

"Heya, Sammy," Dean says at last, and I guess it didn't matter who made the first move, because my world is finally, completely, crashing down around me.

I stand there for a few more seconds, trying to process what's just happened, how Dean is alive, how he's here, but as Dean moves forward, I realize that it can't be him at long last after four agonizing months of waiting for just this, and that this is the worst, cruelest joke anyone has ever played on me, and this is coming from a guy who's wholelife is a terrible, cruel joke.

I tackle him and push him up against the wall, pulling a knife on him, trying to make the thing wearing my brother's face bleed, and he seems surprised to know that I don't understand. I'm going to kill it, rip it apart, probably drink its blood for good measure because I'm so angry, but Bobby grabs me, tells me it's him, it's really him, and I want to believe it so badly, I relax, drop my guard, and all but fall to pieces on the ground.

Dean's here, he's really here, making jokes and laughing, and I fall into his arms, squeeze him so tight, so close, I don't think I'll ever let him go, and Dean does just the same to me.

Dean hugs me and tells me the one thing I've needed to hear for four months without saying a thing, and I try to tell him back, but mostly, I just feel like crying. I don't want to let go of Dean, and I'm pretty sure Dean doesn't want to let go of me. Everything that's happened these past four months just dissolves in his touch, and suddenly, everything makes a lot more sense, because the thing I'm fighting for is right here in front of me.

End

A/N: Thank you all so much for reading and for your continued support throughout this. I might do a sequel in a few months, faster if there's interest in one, that would take place during season four, so just let me know.

Anyway, thank you, and have a great rest of the summer