It's telling in more than one way; always, never, he speaks with a child's certainty and absolutes, mixed in with his adult's view of what he came to understand the holidays meant, the more lonely versions as the years progressed. Sam never made it into the memories, not as more than an idea his parents put into his head: you're going to have a baby brother or sister. Not the ones with both Mary and John running through them. A few days ago, that's where his thoughts would have resided, with the Christmases and Thanksgivings without Mom, the handful he's spent by himself. He's still there, though, when Felix blurts out what he does.

Dean's eyebrows draw together, settling down some. "What?" It startles Dean a little bit, too, and he's waiting for Felix to take it back, but he doesn't. Felix doesn't want to be anywhere, he's made that perfectly clear, and Dean has done his level best to learn it, to accept it; he's not that good at it, but he's tried. But then here, now, suddenly there's evidence that maybe it really is just the Barge where he doesn't want to be, maybe...

The hunter doesn't even stop to acknowledge those people - several of which he knew - left behind. He's on a much more important chase, and he may not get another chance.

"This is a real place," he says, quickly, newly focused. "I mean, this isn't my world, exactly, but my world has a Los Angeles, and a Venice Beach, and they're damn near perfect matches. It has a California, and a... and a Kansas."

And Christmas and Thanksgiving and Sam, even if there's no Mary or John anymore. Even if there's no Felix.