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Contrary to popular opinion, Sam did not hate everything about the Hunter’s Life.By the time he was 17, he had seen places and things that most humans his age could not imagine. Yes, he saw nightmares that he couldn’t wake up from, but he also met good people and learned about love.Sam collected souvenirs from some of those encounters, which he carried with him in an old-fashioned cardboard cigar box, hidden in the bottom of his duffel bag.-----A translucent piece of sea glass from a beach in Maine, shaped like a sleeping cat. Sam was 11. A memory from several weeks of conversations with a retired farmer from Illinois, Carl Madsen, who had moved to the rocky shores of Maine because he loved the ocean. Was not a Hunter but knew some authentic Lore he had picked up from a Danish grandfather. Told the shaggy-haired boy how the sea washed away sin and regret.Mr. Madsen gave Sam the blue-green sea glass artifact; it was the best piece from his personal collection.The farmer would sit outside their motel, three blocks from the waterfront, in a weather-beaten wooden chair, bleached white from the salt and sun. He would ask Sam questions about his homework and relate anecdotes from European history, the man’s favorite subject in high school. His mother made him stick it out and graduate, even though he never wanted to be anything more than a farmer. Glad he did. Had a head full of stories to keep him company during the long Midwestern summer days while he plowed and weeded fields and fed the hogs. And books to keep him company at night.Sam compounded a mix of herbs that he made into a loose tea; one cup with honey would ease the pain of the retired farmer’s arthritic hands for a full day. Got a teary-eyed hug when they left.“You’re a smart one,” said the old farmer. “Stay in school. You won’t regret it.”-----The giant tooth of an ancient vampire–a gift from Dean–weathered with yellow streaks like scrimshaw walrus ivory. Bobby had given it to Dean, and Chuck knows where Bobby found it. It was a present on Sam’s 12th birthday, and Sam knew it was a big deal because Dean had nothing else to give. Sam liked to think that it was the year that Dean gave him everything he had.Until Dean gave his life and soul to save Sam, over and over.The tooth was a reminder, a metaphorical string around his finger, lest Sam forget.------Sam was 13. A thrice-blessed miniature wooden icon from a Russian Orthodox church in Chicago, with which a grateful priest had gifted Sam. Said it could ward off evil. Handy for a young Hunter. Sammy swore it glowed blue in the dark and used it as a night light when John and Dean left him on his own for days.The three Winchesters were finishing a salt and burn on a lone grave under a sheltering sycamore–next to the church’s property but outside of the hallowed cemetery. It was haunted, ironically, by a beloved gardener who had worked for the parish for half a century and who had been outraged in death, because, after all, he had been an outspoken atheist in life.He caused minor mischief, frightening teenagers who parked near his grave to kiss and fumble in a borrowed car and rattling invisible chains during services.The gardener appeared and had a lengthy argument with Sam and the priest. They held his attention while John and Dean–meaning Dean–dug.The priest told his old friend that he was a good man and, regardless of his beliefs, he was going to Heaven, and that was that.“But who will I fight with?” said the ghost, revealing his concern that he would spend eternity alone and bored.The priest thought of his own failing heart and smiled.“I will be there, sooner than you think,” he said, and recited a blessing as his friend disappeared in a burst of embers.-----A silver Star of David on a silver chain, the parting gift of a girl he had met in Oklahoma when she and Sam were 14.Elena was very smart, Jewish, with red curly hair and freckles and aqua eyes like a Blue Mink Tonkinese cat. Already, she had skipped a grade and was a sophomore at a private secular high school. She hoped to attend an engineering college in the foothills west of Denver, Colorado.Elena worked at the OK Deli and Restaurant owned by her Aunt Sara. It was frequented by locals of all faiths, who put aside religious and political differences to commune over two-fisted sandwiches of warm pastrami on dark rye, with sides of homemade beet horseradish, citrusy carrot salad dotted with raisins, and the deli's world-class strudel (apple, cherry, and peach in season) dusted with cinnamon, a recipe smuggled out of the old country (aka the North Side of Chicago, a wedding gift from a Hungarian neighbor who lived next door in their apartment building in Rogers Park).Sam stopped by to see if he could score some day-old bagels at a discount. John, Bobby Singer, and Dean had abandoned Sammy while they traveled through the backwaters of the Sooner State and swapped information with tribal leaders. All the while helping local law enforcement track down human monsters trafficking in children that had been lost in the foster care system.Elena’s Aunt Sara, a tiny woman who had to stand on boxes behind the meat counter to wait on people, took one look at Sam’s thin cheeks and too-big hazel eyes, and ordered him to sit. And eat.When he mumbled something about not having the money, she scolded him, loudly, “Who said anything about money?”, and pointed to an empty corner table. Grabbed a waiter–her youngest son Art, living at home and working at the family business as he made his way through business school and an accounting degree–and shooed him toward Sam.Everyone sitting nearby looked up, grinned sympathetically at the youngest Hunter being bullied by the pint-sized matriarch into staying for a meal (“Sit! Sit!”), and went back to enjoying their own meals.Art bustled over to Sam, who was trying to remember a legitimate vanishing spell he could use on himself, and asked him if he knew what he wanted. Sam shook his head.“Any dietary restrictions?”“I like…vegetables,” he said. Art smiled.“I’ll fix you up really good, kid.”He came back with a big platter that took up half the table, covered with bowls that nested in compartments.“Romanian roast eggplant, buckwheat kasha, Russian potato salad with peas, Romanian tzimmes (carrots with prunes…better than it sounds), cucumber and tomato salad with onions, hummus, turnip mash, and cold beet borscht.”Sam didn’t know what half the words meant, but everything looked and smelled delicious.Another waiter, a distant cousin, brought a basket of crackers and bread, a small ceramic butter dish with a softened stick of real butter, and a small bowl of homemade strawberry jam. Just like he was eating at someone’s house instead of at a restaurant.Art came back with a glass of ice water with a lemon slice and sweetened hot tea smelling of cloves and oranges, golden in a stemmed glass mug that sat in a silver holder.“I can’t pay,” Sam repeated to the young man, not meeting his eye.“Neither could my grandparents and parents and uncles and aunts when they came to America,” he said, “Why do you think my grandparents opened up a deli?”Elena watched the drama as she waited on departing customers at the cash register.-----Sam came to the restaurant every day. The corner table became his home away from the motel, where he could study and snack surrounded by the ebb and flow of a busy eatery.Customers laughed and argued in a half dozen languages: Spanglish, German, Vietnamese, Russian, Yiddish, and Cherokee. Migrant workers, early responders, oil company executives, tourists, local families celebrating birthdays, truckers, tribal officials, office workers, college students, teens in mobs and teens on their first dates, and seniors enjoying their weekly lunch splurge.The regulars would stop by Sam’s table and greet him like a member of the family.(Years later Dean would remark that Sam’s weeks at the deli restaurant, with unlimited free access to a eight-page menu of ethnic food spanning twenty countries, helped kickstart the boy’s subsequent growth spurts.)Sara made sure the young Hunter was served huge portions, so he had plenty to take back to the motel at night, boxed up in Styrofoam containers with extra napkins.Sam wasn’t in school, because he realized the older Winchesters and Bobby wouldn’t be staying long enough to make it worth the time to get him enrolled. The books he brought to the restaurant were for a college-level general studies curriculum, what a freshman would need to master their first year. Elena noticed, and soon they were studying together under her aunt's benevolent eye.Sam thought it was cool that she was from a family that supported the success of smart girls. Her uncles would pass around her report cards and bring them to their blue-collar jobs. Brag to their co-workers about Elena the Scholar who scored top of her class in advanced courses in math and science and English.John, Bobby, and Dean would come back to the motel every few days to check on Sam, restock, and refuel. They gratefully gorged on slow-cooked beef brisket served on bread aus jus, Romanian garlic sausages, potato salad, brined pickles, and cherry strudel. Noodle pudding and blintzes and macaroons.One day, John told Sam to get ready to leave in two hours. The young Hunter returned to the restaurant to thank Sara and Elena and Art.Elena kissed him on the cheek. “We know who you are,” she whispered, and took off the Star of David she wore around her neck and placed it, with its silver chain, in his open palm. She cupped both her hands around his and closed his fist around the pendant.“Behind the pictures on the walls are sigils and wardings, hidden from view but still potent. In the old country, my grandparents were Hunters. Fought against human monsters: the Czar’s corrupt officials, the Communists, and then the Nazis. Here, they wanted a different life for their children. So, we are Talismen. We watch and listen and help as we can."And it has been an honor to feed the Winchesters and Robert Singer. Thank you for your service.”Sam staggered out of the café that last time with a wicker basket packed with enough food to feed the guests at an average-sized Polish wedding.-----Sam and Dean retrieved the wooden box of mementos from their childhood home in Lawrence after Stanford, and Sam transferred his collection of treasures from the cardboard cigar box into the sturdier wooden container. On special occasions, like birthdays, Thanksgiving, and after Saving the World (meaning those events worthy of a Mystical Medal of Honor, at the least), he would look through the contents, contemplating every photo and examining every curio once again.He added fewer items as he grew older. Had fewer good moments to remember. Relied on the memories of the good people from his past to provide respite from the terrors of the present day.When he went to Heaven, the box came with him.The vampire’s tooth sits on its own shelf in a version of Rufus Turner’s cabin in Whitefish, Montana, waiting for Dean to join him. Would not be long now.Sam used the other physical curios to track down the actual souls they represented to their individual Heavens, with a happy Bones shadowing his every move. (It was against the rules, but when did Winchesters ever concern themselves with obeying Supernatural Law?)He found Mr. Madsen the farmer on a comfortable canvas chair, bare feet tickled by ocean waves, with a history book in his lap. He greeted grownup Sam with delight and offered him a cold glass of lemonade. Threw sticks in the water for Bones to retrieve.The Russian Orthodox priest and the atheist gardener were drinking shots of very good vodka in a comfy old bar, snacking on peanuts and pastries and arguing theology and politics and sports, switching sides as suited them. Sam hung around for a round of Moot Court regarding a recent event in Cook County government that set a new standard for corruption. He got to be the referee, which made him ponder, for a few minutes, what that other life might been. He still thinks that version of Samuel Winchester would have made a good judge. Bones was happy to lap at a bowl full of water and scarf down a very good cheeseburger, then napped while the three men picked apart the evidence of demonic cronyism in the Windy City.Sam's final stop before returning to the cabin to read and hike with Bones and wait for his brother: the OK Deli and Restaurant.Sara and her parents and grandparents and hundreds of their closest relatives, who had endured the wickedness of centuries of villains, seemed to be enjoying a perpetual and boisterous family reunion, centered around open-air kitchens and assembly lines of cooks, speaking the myriad tongues of the Diaspora.Bones close on his heels, Sam pushed his way through crowds of people, eating, drinking playing instruments, tell jokes, singing, dancing, and hugging. It being Heaven, he found Sara and Elena and that branch of the family with no problem, serving customers in their version of the Elysian Fields: a replica of the OK, filled with happy souls eating the best strudel this side of Avalon.Elena gave Sam a sweet kiss while Sara applauded and Art handed him a glass of tea. Gave Bones a serving dish of chopped up roast chicken and a big beef bone.Felt like Heaven to Sam, too.