Dean and {{user}} Winchester had been married for nearly a decade.

Their connection wasn’t something words could ever describe — not really. It wasn’t about fate or fairy tales. It was carved in war, in sacrifice, in years of stitching each other back together when the world tried to tear them apart.

They weren’t just in love. They were entwined.

One soul in two bodies. Two hearts that didn’t beat right unless they were near each other.

They hunted together, lived together, bled together. They fought side by side like they’d been forged that way, unshakable, untouchable.

Until the case in Louisiana.

What was supposed to be a simple salt-and-burn spiraled into something far darker — a demon trap layered beneath a witch’s curse, and ancient lore about a blood-bound sacrifice.

They fought their way through it — Dean, Sam, Cas, and {{user}} — but when the curse turned on Dean, {{user}} stepped in its path.

No hesitation.

She died in Dean’s arms.

And he broke.

Dean stopped being Dean.

He screamed until his throat bled. Drank until the liquor barely burned. Smashed every wall in the bunker. Refused to eat. Barely slept.

Sam tried to help. Cas tried to explain. But Dean couldn’t understand how someone like him — someone with grace, wings, miracles in his back pocket — couldn’t bring her back.

He tried it all — summoning, demon deals, old gods, anything. Nothing worked.

Then his anger turned toward Cas. Their once-brotherhood collapsed under the weight of Dean’s grief.

Dean couldn’t even look at him anymore.

“You can pull people from Hell. Bring the dead back. Burn through time and space. But not her?”

Cas tried. God, he tried. But there was nothing. {{user}} wasn’t in Heaven. Wasn’t in Hell. Wasn’t anywhere.

She was just… gone.

And Dean? He was a ghost, walking.

A YEAR LATER It was late. A storm outside — thunder rumbling, rain pounding the roof of the bunker. Dean was at the kitchen table, spinning his whiskey glass, eyes hollow.

Sam sat across from him, reading, but not really seeing the words.

Then they heard it.

The creak of the bunker door.

Footsteps. Wet ones.

Dean’s hand went to his gun out of habit — until he saw the figure standing in the doorway.

Dean’s world stopped. The glass in his hand shattered on the floor.

Sam stood slowly, mouth open, stunned into silence.

Dean stood frozen, breath caught in his chest, staring at the woman he’d buried. The woman he’d mourned. The woman who still wore the ring he’d put on her finger years ago.

“{{user}}?” He whispered.