Dean had blood dripping from his eyebrow, Sam was trying to keep a dislocated shoulder in its socket, and you were hotwiring a rusted truck with nothing but a paperclip, a prayer, and your last ounce of patience. “You got it?” Dean barked, dragging a duffel of weapons and limping toward the door.

“Almost!” you hissed, sparks flying under the dash.

Dean whirled around, shotgun raised. “Son of a bitch-” And then, in that perfect, panicked Dean Winchester way, he snapped: “You get us outta this and I’ll even let you drive Baby!”

You froze. Blinked. “…Seriously?”

“YES, DAMMIT! MOVE!” The engine roared to life. You floored it, slammed the door, and all three of you peeled out of the lot like demons were licking your heels. But after that case, you didn’t let him forget it. For three days, you brought it up with the kind of smugness that only someone who survived a vampire ambush and earned the Impala could have.

“You said it,” you reminded him, sipping your coffee at a gas station while Baby gleamed behind you.

“I was bleeding from my face,” he grumbled. “People say stupid stuff when they’re dying.”

“You swore, Dean.”

He glared, and then, with a sigh, he fished the keys from his pocket. She’s all yours,” he said, folding his arms across his chest like he hadn’t just handed you the holy grail. “Don’t make me regret it.” You caught the keys mid-air and tried to play it cool, though your brain was already halfway down a panic spiral. Don’t scratch her. Don’t hit a pothole. Don’t even look at a curb. You got her started. She purred under your hands. Dean leaned in through the window. “Keep her under 70.”

You raised an eyebrow. “Since when do you keep her under 70?”

He smirked. “I trust me. You, I’m still workin’ on.” You flipped him off with a grin and pulled away from the motel lot, trying not to visibly white-knuckle the wheel. He watched you go, arms crossed, brows tight, a nervous mess. And that was the thing about Dean and that car. She wasn’t just his. She was him. His history, his comfort, his one constant. Baby had seen every inch of this country. She’d carried the Winchesters through loss and laughter and pain and apocalypse. And now, God help him, she was in your hands. Which is exactly why you decided to mess with him. You waited twenty minutes before you called.

He picked up on the first ring. “What’s wrong?” he asked, immediately alert.

You winced, just enough to sell it. “Okay, uh… just promise me you’re not gonna freak out.”

“{{user}}.”

“I had to pull over,” you said, letting your voice tremble just a little. “Something felt… off.”

You could practically hear him tense on the other end. “Are you okay? What kind of off? What happened? Is she smoking?”

“No, no, I’m okay, it’s just-she started running kind of rough. I didn’t want to mess anything up, so I pulled over and Googled what it could be.” There was a beat of silence. A dangerous beat.

“You Googled it,” he repeated.

“I didn’t want to bother you!” you defended. “Anyway, one of the top results said it could be low oil or old oil. So I figured hey, I can fix that. How hard can an oil change be? I mean… you let me watch you do it two weeks ago remember? Figured two weeks was long enough to-“

“You changed the oil?”

“Yeah. I went to Walmart.”

“Walmart.”

You bit your lip to keep from laughing. “I bought oil and everything.”

He was trying so hard not to yell. “oh m-my god…” you could hear him trying not to puke. He muted the phone before he comes back breathless, as if he just lost his shit. “Alright. Alright. Just tell me you used full synthetic?”

“Well, no see, I didn’t have the money for that but I promise I got the next best thing.” You heard him almost growl, trying to keep his cool.

“High mileage?”

“Vegetable oil.” You say proudly as if you did the right thing. He made a sound, somewhere between a gasp and a horror movie scream.

“YOU WHAT?! Ohhhh you better be fucking with me.” He sounded so distressed.

“I figured oil’s oil, right?”

“NO! Oh my-You… You put VEGETABLE OIL in a CLASSIC AMERICAN ICON?!”