Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Castiel awakes before he remembers he’s supposed to be dead.

Stars are blinking in the night sky above him. Cas breathes once, twice, counts his heartbeats. Flexes his fingers and feels dewy grass beneath his palms.

In his disorientation and his exhaustion, he can’t bring himself to move at first. He lays there, watching the sky. He wonders briefly if the Empty has taken mercy on him and has let him slip into a pleasant dream. He can taste mountain air on his tongue and it tastes familiar.

It’s jarring in a way that’s not easily described—to go from his seraph form to his human one. All of his wings and his eyes housed on a single plane, this map of flesh and blood and hair, all carefully containing his grace like an overflowing cup. He wonders if some parts of him might slip out and spill onto the grass beneath him. It feels like he’s flitting out of bounds. 

He needs to get up, he knows. The knowing doesn’t make it any less difficult, though.

It takes time, but he does it: Cas rises to his feet, his wings feeling heavy on his back. A stench of burning meat fills his nostrils, a stench he knows only exists on the ethereal plane—his eight wings, burnt beyond recognition. Unusable. One of the many forms of the Empty’s punishment.

Cas quickly takes stock of himself—he’s alive, at least he thinks. He must be. Back in his human form, in the vessel he’s grown so fond of. His suit and trench coat snug around him. He lifts one of his hands and runs it down the lines of his face—his nose, his eyelids, the strands of his hair. He’s in one piece. He’s not sure how, though. He’s supposed to be dead.

Cas muses idly that if he’s somehow been resurrected again, the Empty is only going to be more furious with him.

Better to make sure he doesn’t die, then.

Cas tilts his face up to the stars, breathing in deep and centering himself. Then he lets them guide him home.

Cas isn’t sure where he’s going. He lets the stars guide him, his angelic instincts old and familiar as his face in the mirror. To know where he’s going, he would need to know where he is currently, and he doesn’t. He’s in some kind of field, bordered on one side by forestry and the other by rows of wheat. His path takes him through the wheat. Then, after the wheat, a two-lane road.

He picks a direction and begins walking.

Despite his unease, Cas recognizes the area in a distant way—the way one might recognize their childhood bedroom. It’s familiar and Cas knows he’s been here before—he just doesn’t know when. It must have been fleeting enough that he was only here once, or in passing, because he can’t pinpoint the exact location. He thinks he’s in South Dakota, though.

Though his powers are weak and he’s unable to fly, they give him enough energy that the miles he walks take no significant toll. It’s a good thing, too, because it’s hours before he finds any sign of life: a gas station with blinking neon lights. There are no cars in sight so he walks inside the station, curious.

The station is small, with only a few rows of items. A bored looking teenager doing a crossword sits behind the counter, and barely glances at Cas when he comes in.

Cas finds himself drawn to a newspaper stand near the front of the store. Before him, in black and white print, Cas finds the answers he’s looking for, and a whole host of questions.

On the front page of the paper, a date: July 13, 2006.

There are two irrefutable truths that Cas has learned during his time on Earth.

One: nothing is as it first appears to be. The furrow of Dean’s brow, his calloused fingerpads, the clench of his jawbone—by all accounts, Dean Winchester had appeared to Castiel as rough around the edges; rageful, hateful, anguished. Scarred from hellfire, plunging a knife straight into Cas’s chest upon their first meeting. His determination, his disregard for Cas’s holiness, his disbelief, even his contempt—Dean is not at all how he first portrayed himself to Cas. There were two phases of knowing Dean: knowing him, then understanding him. Loving him happened somewhere between the two, an indeterminable occurrence he will never pinpoint.

And two: every good deed has a consequence. Though Castiel could never bring himself to regret calling upon the Empty and saving Dean, he always knew there would be consequences to it: ones he might live to see, and ones he might not. It seems this is the latter, because although Cas is very much alive, he’s not where he’s supposed to be. He’s not with Dean.

Cas contemplates briefly if this is part of the Empty’s plan—to take him away from Dean. To give him a second chance at life, only without the one thing that makes him want to live at all.

Castiel has learned two things, so he knows this: this is not what it seems. And this is a consequence he’s brought upon himself—and like all consequences, he must endure for what he’s done.

The first time Cas tries, he nearly kills himself in an attempt to fly back to 2020.

He knows before he does it that it’s impossible, knows it will only add strain to his injured wings. But he’s desperate. Any trepidation he might house upon seeing Dean again after his confession is overridden by his desire to see him again at all—to witness with his own eyes that Dean and everyone else he loves is alive and okay. He has no idea what’s happened with Chuck, if maybe Chuck is actually the one who did this to him. Last he saw Dean, Sam and Jack had gone to look for the others. He has no way to know whether any of them made it out.

The decision is made before he makes it: he needs to get back to his family, he needs to get back home. But his wings—

Still, he tries. Each attempt, he falls to the ground, and it takes him longer and longer to get back up. The ache of his joints, the blisters and bone and, fuck, it’s agony. He’s just torturing himself, he knows. But he has to get back.

By the time dawn blooms across the horizon like a rose, Cas is a quivering mass of flesh and bone. He can’t bring himself to stand up again. He lays there for a long time.

After his agony subsides, Cas finds the strength to drag himself to his knees. His hands folded in his lap, he lets his eyes fall shut and he prays:

Jack, can you hear me? Are you there?

Light streaks across the sky and time passes, inevitable as it always does, but Cas stays on his knees, praying. Hoping.

Jack never answers his calls.

When Cas gets up and begins walking again, it’s only to go back inside the gas station.

The teenage employee is gone and an older man has taken his place.

“Excuse me,” Cas says, startled to hear his own voice after sitting in silence for so long. “Could you tell me where I am?”

“Beg your pardon?” The man says, raising an eyebrow.

“I’ve been traveling,” Cas quickly fibs. “I think I got lost. I’m in South Dakota, correct?”

“Sioux Falls in two miles north,” the man says and—Jesus Christ.

Cas wonders if it's entirely coincidence or entirely on purpose that he’s found his way back to Sioux Falls. Knows it depends on who, or what, brought him here.

He’s hesitant to believe he’s that lucky. Fate has never been so kind to him.

“Thank you.”

At the very least, Cas has a direction: north.

When Cas happens upon a motel a few hours later, he realizes belatedly he doesn’t have any money.

In the July sun, the heat is stifling. The temperature has been rising steadily throughout the day and he hasn’t had any water yet. Cas can tell he’s still an angel, but his powers have been failing for a long time. He needs water and rest. If he finds neither, lack of one or the other will kill him.

But amidst the urge to panic, Cas breathes in deep: he’s done this before. He’s been here before. He’s more prepared now.

This time won’t be like before.

By the time night falls, Cas has acquired water and shelter. He feels guilty for stealing the car—but he’s out of options. He needs someplace safe to stay for the night.

Cas drives further into Sioux Falls, staying around the outskirts. He picks a location, a trail near the woods and parks. It’s not ideal but it will keep him alive for the night.

Cas falls asleep under the glittering stars and winking moon.

His days go like this: he wakes, he prays to Jack, he tries and fails to fly. Rinse. Repeat.

The days bleed into weeks bleed into months and he knows time is passing because he grows more restless by the day, but he’s healing, too. Cas is unsure of exactly what the Empty had done to his wings, but they ache less as the months pass, though they’re still unusable. Something is better than nothing, Cas decides.

Despite his dislike of dishonesty, Cas realizes two weeks in that living in the small Honda Civic he’s taken is not sustainable long term—nor is drinking from a nearby park water fountain. So he takes the plunge and finds an ATM in a convenience store—then uses his powers to empty it of its cash. He drives to that first motel he came across, on the border of Sioux Falls, and books a room.

It’s easy, like slipping into an old pair of slippers. Cas learned this routine years ago, perfected it with the help of the Winchesters. Though motel walls have never been home to him the way they’ve been to Sam and Dean, they’re familiar. It makes Cas feel more like he’s found his footing. He’s not sure what his plan is yet, but at least he’s not sleeping in a car anymore.

Cas sleeps mostly through the night now—it’s taken a toll on his body, what the Empty put him through. He rests more and he heals more—his grace fleeting and flickering. Caught somewhere between angel and human.

He thinks of his family often and falls asleep every night picturing Dean’s eyes.

In the midst of focusing on healing, Cas finds himself searching for something to occupy his time—something other than trying and failing to get home. It’s all too easy to fall back into what he knows: hunting.

He airs on the side of caution, of course. Though no angels—other than perhaps Gabriel and Anna—were on Earth in 2006, he has no way of knowing if he’s been just thrust back in time, or if he’s found his way into an alternate universe. The strands of each timeline are complex and unique and they run together in a way that even Cas struggles to understand. The composition of the universe, of each universe—it’s meant to be comprehended by beings much greater than angels—by God.

Cas tries not to think about God these days.

So, he plays it safe. Within the first three months he spends in 2006, from July to August to early September, Cas goes on two hunts total. Small hauntings—hunts he could easily complete were he fully human. As it is, he keeps his head down and does some good in the interim.

Still, it nags at him—the fear that this isn’t the interim. That this is just his life now.

Cas has never accepted what fate has placed before him. He’s not about to start now.

It happens on September 18. Cas isn’t sure why he’s surprised. He should have known. That day is a harbinger of many things, for him—it always has been.

Still, he isn’t expecting it.

It begins simple enough: another haunting. Big enough that it made the local papers, but Cas still doesn’t think much of it. The local police are handling it and the FBI hasn’t gotten involved. He doesn’t see the harm in assisting with the case.

His motel room has become his home base: through the months, he’s acquired basic human necessities, including a small wardrobe. Band tee shirts and distressed jeans, clothes that make him think of Dean. He revels in the little ways to remind himself of why he’s still going, who he’s working to get back to. He still prays every day. If he refuses to waver in anything, it’s that. He has to believe Jack will hear him.

It goes like this: Cas follows a lead to an old abandoned warehouse. By all appearances completely deserted. The ghost haunting a local family is tied to an artifact there. His mission is simple: find it and destroy it. Nothing he hasn’t done before. He’s an angel still, even if he’s weaker than usual. He can handle one little haunting.

But, like all good things, like all destined things, it doesn’t go according to plan; an iron bar clenched in his fist and a trickle of blood creeping down from his hairline to his chin, Cas has the beginnings of a headache. This ghost is surprisingly strong, even pinned against an angel.

Cas has made a point to refrain from using his powers in a big way when possible, even on hunts. The last thing he wants is to draw the attention of the angels. Using it in small increments, for small things, is alright. But nothing big. He can’t risk being found in the wrong timeline or wrong year. The angels would surely annihilate him.

Back pressed against the warehouse walls, he fumbles his lighter at the worst possible moment. The ghost is tied to a pocketwatch buried in the piles of rubble in the warehouse—he just needs to burn it. The ghost very much so does not want to let him.

It’s charging him in a way Cas knows is going to hurt; hand clenched around the bar, his body aching and his grace flickering, time slows down to a pinpoint: and in it, everything changes.

“Look out!”

It’s the sound of a voice—a voice other than his—that truly catches Cas off guard at first. The ghost knocks him down because of course it does and—there, in the corner of his eye—

A figure, shadowed by the night, swings hard and fast, and a pipe arcs inches from Cas’s face. Flat on his back, Cas scrambles to his knees—have the local police found him?

Then more shouting and—that voice, he knows that voice, but something sounds off about it, something sounds wrong—

“Sammy, shoot it!”

Gunshots echo in the warehouse and Cas stays frozen in his spot. Eyes wide, limbs stiff, time slows down down down and Cas is drowning. He’s drowning.

“Out of the way!”

Other voices register in his mind belatedly but he can’t inspect them, not now. Can’t think, can’t feel.

The hard ground underneath him, dirt coating the skin of his palms. The blood on his face itches something terrible. Moonlight is streaming in through the broken windows, illuminating a face and—

Cas breathes in, breathes out. Tears sting at the corner of his eyes and his vision blurs. He can’t bring himself to blink them away, can’t bring himself to look.

I’m dreaming, Cas thinks as more gunshots ring out and the voices overlap. This is a dream. I’m still in the hotel and I’m dreaming.

But he won’t wake up. He can’t. Cas tries, kneeling defeated in his spot on the floor, but he won’t. Wake. Up.

Jack, can you hear me? Please tell me you can hear me. Please take me home. Take me home right now.

Cas squeezes his eyes shut, tears cutting paths through the dust on his face. He can’t look.

So he focuses on his breathing. In, out, in, out, in. Over and over. He doesn’t think of anything else, doesn’t feel anything else.

Cas has no idea how long he stays like that—he only knows that he’s ripped away from this peace far too soon.

“Hey!”

Hands, there are hands on his shoulders. Cas sucks in a trembling breath and his eyes fly open and, there—right in front of him—

Green eyes, boring into his. Face creased in a frown, hair matted with blood, freckles peeking through specks of grime.

I’m dead, Cas thinks. I’m dead and this is a dying vision.

“Hey, pal! You okay? Can you hear me?”

He shakes Cas lightly and Cas—blinks. Breathes. And breathes.

Looking into the eyes of Dean Winchester for the first time in three months, Cas breathes.

Chapter Text

There’s a certain type of sadness, Cas has learned, that comes with being in love. And it’s subtle enough that in the very beginning, he didn’t really notice it.

It would crop up at unexpected times: watching Dean throw his head back and laugh in the dim lamplight of the bunker kitchen; being curled up on the couch next to him while a movie flickers in the background; gentle touches and bitter fights and tracking the way his soul pulses with each breath in. Cas has loved Dean for a very, very long time now. And housed alongside the joy and the want, slotted firmly in place, is an irrefutable sadness he’s never been able to contain.

Looking at Dean now, younger than Cas has ever seen him, it flares, bright and painful, in his chest.

He’s staring, he knows he’s staring but he can’t bring himself to tear his eyes away—not when he’s finally seeing Dean for the first time after everything went to hell in the dungeon. His green eyes, the curve of his mouth, the set of his jaw—Cas wants to engrave every little detail in his memory. He never wants to look away.

“Sammy, a little help over here!”

There, one of the changes—other than the youth of his face, his voice sounds different, too. Almost lighter, not as deep as the Dean he knows.

“Holy shit, where did he come from?”

Footsteps approach in his peripheral but still Cas can’t force his eyes to stray. They stay locked on Dean and time slows down to a thrumming crawl. This moment feels significant in a way few others have. He knows a turning point sometimes as he gets to the curve; he knows things will never be the same after this.

“Hey, are you okay? Sir?”

It’s the deference to Cas’s age that finally snaps Cas out of it—Sam’s halting voice, higher-pitched than he’s ever heard it. He looks from Dean, to Sam—notes the blood coating both of their faces. Realizes he’s going to have to say something. Cas knows as he opens his mouth that he has no idea what’s going to come out.

“I’m alright,” he says. Strange, to hear his own voice in this echoing warehouse. He hasn’t done much talking the last few months—what with having no one to talk to.

“Boys! You good?”

There—another voice. More figures approach in his peripheral but Cas can’t help his eyes falling back on Dean. There’s a familiar leather jacket wrapped around his shoulders—one Cas knows holds significance. It had been John’s, if he remembers right.

For some reason, in that moment, Cas thinks of purgatory—seeing Dean again for the first time in a year, clenching his hands into fists to refrain from embracing Dean. Not allowing himself to touch, not allowing himself to get close. Blood-soaked, beautiful Dean who had torn through a monsterland to find him and bring him home. Cas had been so undeserving of Dean’s kindness then. His sadness had flowered intertwined with the love he felt—an ache behind his ribs every time he caught Dean’s eyes. In those days, Dean finding him had almost felt like a punishment simply because leaving Dean has always been the hardest thing Cas has had to do.

Watching the furrow of his brow now, Cas wonders if this is a punishment, too.

“You alright there, stranger?”

Cas’s eyes flick to the new figure standing behind the Winchesters and—oh. Cas hadn’t thought he’d ever see her again.

“Yes,” Cas says, watching the way Ellen sheathes the gun in her hand in a smooth, practiced motion. “Forgive me, I—I think I hit my head.”

It’s the only thing Cas can think to say in the moment.

“I think you might have a concussion, dude. You hit the floor like a sack of potatoes.”

“Dean!”

Despite everything, Cas has to fight the twitch at the corner of his mouth. Sam smacks Dean’s arm and Dean rolls his eyes and—it’s so familiar. An echo of the Sam and Dean he knows. It’s like staring straight into his own memories.

“Like you were doing any better,” Sam says with a scoff. “You’re lucky Jo found the watch when she did. You were getting your ass kicked.”

The light bickering, the little barbs thrown with no real intent, Cas can feel his eyes stinging again but he can’t cry now, not with everyone watching him.

“Sam’s right. You’re welcome.”

And there, Jo’s pointed voice—Cas tracks it to the corner of the warehouse where smoke smolders up high towards the vaulted ceiling. Although Cas has known for months now that it’s 2006, the youth of their faces and their voices is still startling.

“You here alone?” Ellen asks, eyebrow raised. “That was a nasty ghost. Were you trying to take it on yourself?”

Cas blinks, trying to think of a proper response. He has the insane urge to immediately confess everything—not that they would believe him. He can feel the words, trapped behind his tongue, wanting to get out but—he knows better. He knows.

“It’s never been an issue before,” he says instead.

“Don’t sweat it, man,” Dean—past Dean? Sort-of Dean? says. It’s difficult to think of this Dean as his Dean, because he knows his Dean, and his Dean isn’t like this. “Happens to the best of us.”

He winks then and Sam rolls his eyes at him.

Everything about this Dean is wrong, Cas decides. He’s too buoyant, too playful. Dean carries his past draped around him like a physical thing—the set of his shoulders and the grim lines of his face, you can pick apart and look at the years and the losses Dean’s survived. His soul is marred from hellfire from his time in the pit.

But this Dean? His eyes glint in the sun and his smile is wide, seemingly genuine. There’s nothing draped around his shoulders like a cloak, no heaviness weighing him down. His soul blinks in the moonlight, untouched. Radiant.

It presents Cas with something he hasn’t considered before: maybe he doesn’t know Dean as well as he thinks. Because the Dean before him is something he’s never encountered before.

“Ignore him,” Sam says. “Sorry, what did you say your name was?”

Cas swallows, uneasy.

“I didn’t,” he says. He knows he has a decision to make here.

Because despite the happenstance of this meeting—despite the fate of it, the randomness of it, whatever the case may be—Cas does not belong here. This is not his year, this is not his family, this might not even be his timeline. He does not belong here and he wants to go home. Getting involved with these—these other versions of the people he loves is walking a dangerous line.

Cas thinks of the way his life changed in such a fundamental way upon his first meeting with Dean—face-to-face, in a ramshackle barn, the rapid-fire adjustment of inhabiting a vessel and laying eyes on the soul he had rebuilt, piece by piece. Every single word that they exchanged that first night. Revealing his wings to a human for the first time in his existence. Time narrowing down to a pinpoint; Cas knows that night in the barn with Dean was the inciting incident for the rest of his life, for the only part of his life that would end up mattering to him. The very Earth had trembled when their eyes first met, as if it knew what was coming.

Loving Dean was, Cas thinks, inevitable for him.

And loving Dean is more than just a choice Cas makes—to devote his love to someone like Dean, it’s as integral to Cas’s sense of self and personhood as his own name. Just as familiar and necessary.

Cas does not owe these people anything. And this? It’s not his problem. He likes the life he was living with Dean. He’s going to find his way back to it if it kills him.

“I should be on my way,” Cas says quietly. He can only tear his gaze away from Dean because he doesn’t want to see what look he might have on his face as he says it.

He’s not your Dean, Cas reminds himself. This is a Dean you never met. This version of him doesn’t exist anymore. 

“You sure you’re alright, dude?” Dean’s voice is so light, it’s so easy, and something in Cas screams out wrong wrong wrong. “You took a hell of a hit there.”

Cas’s gaze inevitably is drawn back to Dean and—

Cas is thrown back to a memory where he’s sprawled out on a dirty warehouse floor, not dissimilar to this one, with blood on his face, and Dean crouched in front of him and—Dean had leaned forward, had taken Cas’s face into his hands and looked right into his eyes.

Dean’s closeness is a privilege Cas isn’t afforded often. The times he is, he cherishes. That memory, despite the grim circumstances surrounding it, that one memory of Dean’s palms on his face—his concern, his care for Castiel—is enough to make Cas’s grace pulse within him even now. Cas supposes his desire for Dean’s closeness is not unlike a drug dependency; no amount is ever enough to satisfy him.

The sheer contrast of that memory and this—of the Dean that reached out to him so desperately, and this Dean—this Dean who gazes at him with borderline disinterest, having no more concern for Cas than he would have for any stranger who may need help—it hurts. It hurts him in a way he hadn't even known he could feel.

It comes in a wave, this wash of emotion—the unfairness of it all, the injustice. Cas is so in love and he and Dean had been happy. Maybe Cas never would have gotten the one thing he wants, but it isn’t about that. It’s about the sacrifice and the suffering and every wretched thing Cas has endured; beating the odds, defying fate, defying God to make his way back to Dean each and every time they were separated.

And all at once Cas feels very tired and very old. Months, it’s been months, and Jack hasn’t answered a single prayer. At this point, there’s no feasible way for Cas to know if he’s even still alive. If anyone he loves is.

The tears come before he can stop them.

In any other situation, it would be comical, the way Sam and Dean’s faces change. Cas realizes he’s laughing as he’s crying and he knows that these versions of his friends no doubt think he’s insane but it’s—ridiculous. This entire situation is completely fucking ridiculous and Cas doesn’t know how much longer he can tolerate the madness.

He just wants to go home.

His chuckles taper off until he’s left sniffling. His tears make his skin feel even dryer and he mindlessly wipes a hand across his cheeks. He looks like a mess, he’s sure of it.

“My apologies,” Cas croaks out, distantly noting the muted looks of alarm on their faces. “I may have hit my head harder than I originally thought. I’m—I’m not feeling well. I should go.”

Cas stumbles the first time he tries to rise to his feet, but he gets there.

“Is there someone we can call for you?”

It’s Jo’s voice this time. Cas turns to her as he’s dusting the grime from his jeans. Her expression is carefully neutral but Cas can hear how her heart rate accelerates. He feels bad. He hadn’t meant to frighten her.

“No,” Cas says quietly and forces a weak smile. “No, I don’t—it’s just me. I’ll be fine.”

Sam and Dean glance over their shoulders and—they’re trading looks, the four of them, presumably about Cas.

“You know, I didn’t know there were any other hunters ‘sides us in the area,” Ellen says, her voice somewhere between suspicious and intrigued.

“I’m not from here,” Cas says simply. “Excuse me.”

While he had only been using it as an excuse, it seems Cas did indeed get hit harder than he thought—because the first steps he takes are shaky and he finds himself stumbling. He realizes belatedly it’s probably the adrenaline and the sheer craziness of this whole situation. His hands are trembling and he squeezes them into fists, frustrated with himself.

“Whoa, take it easy.” Sam stands in front of him now and—Cas doesn’t mean to reach out, he really doesn’t, but he feels positively drained of all energy. Sam steadies him. Cas doesn’t know whether to be grateful or ashamed.

“Forgive me,” Cas says again, dragging a hand down his face. “I’m not—I don’t feel well.”

“Yeah, you said that,” Sam says quietly and—even with the pitch difference, Cas recognizes the tone he’s using. It’s what Cas refers to as Sam’s Spooked Animal voice. He uses it mostly with victims who he feels sorry for and is trying to placate. “Maybe you should sit down.”

Cas most definitely does not want to sit down and spend any longer in this godforsaken warehouse than he has to but his legs make the decision for him, and he plops gracelessly back to the ground.

Cas thinks he finally, truly understands the term “rock bottom” now.

“Look, man, why don’t you let us at least give you a ride? You can barely walk. There’s no way you’re going anywhere on your own. Where do you live?”

Cas considers Dean carefully. No, this isn’t his Dean. But his Dean isn’t here right now and Cas doesn’t know what to do.

“I don’t—” Cas glances skyward briefly, hating the way his eyes immediately sting with tears. “I’m only passing through,” he says, voice trembling. Doesn’t say he’s staying at the motel because the thought of going back there alone, jelly-legged and exhausted like this, is likely to break him completely. He doesn’t know what he needs right now but he knows it isn’t that.

Ellen comes to him now, crouching down so he can look into her eyes.

“Can I ask you something?”

Cas hesitates, then nods.

“Why are you here?”

A pause.

“You mean—here, in this warehouse, or—”

“I mean, why’d you do this hunt? What’s it to you?”

Cas opens his mouth to speak and realizes he doesn’t have a real answer to give. He can’t tell the truth but he doesn’t want to lie to her.

He decides on a compromise—a half-truth.

“It needed doing. And I could do it. So why wouldn’t I?”

She holds his gaze a moment longer, her eyes flicking to Jo’s briefly and she nods ever so slightly. Jo nods back.

“Okay,” Ellen says in a tone of voice that implies she’s come to a decision. “Alright, up you get, stranger. You’re coming with us.”

“I am?” Cas says.

“He is?” Sam and Dean say.

“Look, hunting is a rare business in these parts,” Ellen says. “There ain’t many of us left.” She pauses. “We’ll patch you up, you can get some rest, and be on your way in the morning. Okay?”

Cas takes stock of himself the best he can and weighs his options.

He’s hurt—nothing serious but he’s more exhausted than he can ever remember being. And he doesn’t want to be alone right now. These people, they may be versions of his friends that he never met, but the foundations of them are the same. They are still, in essence, the same people at their core, and these are people he knows he can trust.

And they’re offering him help when he is, quite literally, as alone as it is possible for him to be.

The decision is made before he consciously makes it.

“Okay,” Cas says.

Cas isn’t entirely sure where they’re taking him at first. Ellen had cryptically left it at “A friend’s”—but when he sees the sign for Singer’s Salvage Yard, all the pieces slot in place and Cas aches.

Laying eyes on Bobby for the first time in nearly a decade takes Cas’s breath away. It’s bittersweet, the tender thumbing of a bruise—Cas hadn’t realized how his grief for Bobby sat just beneath the surface of his skin until locking eyes with him across the junk yard that will, 15 years down the line, be the only standing memorial to this man.

“You bringing home strays now?” Bobby grumbles. Ellen is unfazed.

“Relax, Singer. He helped us with the ghost.”

Bobby squints at him, seemingly assessing, before the hunch of his shoulders relaxes and he shrugs.

“Alright, bring him on in.”

And just like that, Cas is welcomed into a home it took him painstaking months to earn his way into the first time around.

Bobby’s house is different than he remembers. He’s unsure whether that’s because nostalgia and time has warped his perception of past events, or if this is just an alternate universe in which Bobby’s house is not the same as it is in Cas’s world.

Cas has been careful not to say much—or anything, really. There’s a fear in the back of his mind of accidentally letting the wrong thing slip, even something small, that reveals him as an imposter. These walls are one of the first homes that Cas ever had. But he still does not belong within them. Not here.

Dean seems, for the most part, unbothered by his silence. His gaze is distant—not as heavy as Cas is used to seeing it, but there’s something melancholy about the way his gaze rests, unfocused, out the window on the drive to Bobby’s. His mind is clearly elsewhere. Cas sifts through what he knows of Dean’s life before they met, trying to parse out what it is that’s hurting him.

Sam sends him the occasional curious glance but he too seems preoccupied. Cas wonders how long it’s been since John’s death or if that hasn’t happened yet. Was that 2005 or 2006? He can’t remember. Dean never spoke of their father much, apart from a few hushed confessions about the things he used to say to Dean.

Jo has been watching him from the corner of her eye. It’s done in a way that if Cas were anything but an angel he wouldn’t notice. As it is, he does. He knows she doesn’t trust him. He can’t blame her.

“Well, it’s not much,” Bobby announces, pulling Cas from his thoughts. “But it’s home.”

For his part, Bobby seems only mildly interested in Cas’s presence here. That’s fair enough.

“It’s lovely,” Cas says softly, and means it. “Thank you.”

“You got a name, son?” Bobby asks. The others look to him, now. He knows he can’t put this off forever but—it feels too much like sealing his fate, too much like he’s guilty of—of something.

Cas thinks back then, really thinks, trying to pinpoint the first time Dean called him that—finds he can’t remember the precise day but can remember the way it made him feel. God, he had felt and he felt nothing back then.

He realizes, then, that it doesn’t really matter. Because Cas is who he is. Who he is now, is built upon a foundation Dean first laid.

“Cas,” he says, his voice steady. “My name is Cas.”

Chapter Text

There are few times in Castiel’s life he would characterize as fateful. So much of his existence has been at the behest of someone else’s ideas of what is right; for most of his life, he was doing as he thought he should as a soldier of God, serving God. But meeting Dean changed everything.

Cas knows his life can be split into two parts: before Dean, and after Dean. Even if Cas were to put aside Chuck’s role in the decisions he made as an angel, everything was different after he saved Dean. For the trajectory of his life to change so drastically, so suddenly in the grand scheme of things—that feels more like fate than actual fate. The propensity of Dean’s soul has always been such that he’s able to alter the course of those around him without even trying; with just his proximity, his nearness, Dean inspires change for the better. And it’s for that reason Cas thinks of Dean as the greatest—and only—fateful thing to ever befall him. Nothing so magical, so monumental, had happened to him before, or since.

In the quiet of the night, with everyone gone to their respective rooms to sleep, Cas curls up on the couch and watches the moon through the window, contemplating the nature of fate. Praying, same as he has been, to Jack. By this point, he knows not to expect an answer. It’s more for the sake of routine, for what little comfort the act provides him. It makes him feel less alone—and like maybe there’s still hope that one day Jack will return his call.

Cas knows he should leave before the others wake up again. He should leave this house, leave this town, hell, leave South Dakota altogether and never look back. That would be the kind thing to do, the responsible thing. Cas knows falling in with these people will only bring them doom. And yet—

It feels fateful in a way that’s impossible for Cas to ignore. That he should find them tonight of all nights, September 18 reaching through the timelines and into his head. Somehow, the universe has brought him to Dean again.

Cas thinks back to the early days, to his first real rebellion for Dean—toe-to-toe in the green room Zachariah trapped him in, Dean’s snarling words stung like barbed wire. Cas had been so unused to feeling back then, he hadn’t known how to handle it. The risk he took for Dean—looking God in the eye as they defied him, even unknowingly—the claim he staked by declaring We’re making it up as we go. He was Dean’s, even then, before he was even aware of it. Before either of them were.

Cas may not have much faith in destiny these days but that he should happen upon the Winchesters entirely by accident is no accident. If he’s sure of anything about this entire situation, it’s that. This is no mistake.

What he doesn’t know is the purpose of this.

And thus Cas arrives at a crossroads with one very important decision to make: to trust this trick of fate, or to run from it. The problem is, Cas has never had much faith in himself. And he’s afraid to make the wrong choice.

“Can’t sleep?”

Cas jumps at the voice suddenly coming from his left. He turns, meets Ellen’s gaze head-on. Relaxes in increments.

“I’ve been told I overthink things,” Cas says quietly. He knows he owes Ellen—knows it was her decision to let him stay the night—and it feels wrong to throw a gift like that away. He thinks of the last time he saw the Ellen from his time, internally wincing at the thought. She and Jo seemed so good—kind-hearted yet fierce. He wishes he could have helped them, back then. And he knows how much they meant to Sam and Dean.

“Want a drink to go with that overthinking?”

“I’m alright,” he says, then hesitates. “Couldn’t sleep, either?”

“Nah,” she says. She shrugs like it’s not a big deal but there are bags beneath her eyes and a tenseness to her shoulders that’s been there since the hunt. Cas realizes he never learned much about the Harvelles, because he has no idea what could be keeping her up. He thinks Dean may have mentioned Ellen’s husband—and Jo’s father—at one point, but he can’t remember the content of the conversation. Cas can only assume he’s dead, seeing as he’s not here with them.

“It’s lovely here,” Cas says instead.

“What, Sioux Falls?”

“This house,” he says. “It’s very—lived in. Homely.”

Ellen leans back against Bobby’s desk, seemingly assessing him.

“Where you from, Cas?”

“...Illinois.”

Cas feels almost guilty about the lie—he’s not entirely sure why his mind went there, but it did. Jimmy had been from Pontiac. And while Cas knows Jimmy’s not in this body anymore—any trace of him has long since been stripped away—his body was modeled after Jimmy’s. It feels more honest than any other place he could pick at random.

“You said earlier you’re just passing through. You plan on staying long?”

Cas hesitates, considering her quietly. He wants to be as honest as he can with her—he thinks she’s more than earned that. And he’s always been a bad liar.

He also respects her, and he values her opinion of him; even this version of Ellen that doesn’t know him still granted him kindness in a moment of vulnerability. Regardless of how she may differ from the Ellen he met in his own time, she’s been good to him and she clearly has a good heart.

“I suppose I’ve been looking for something worth staying for,” he answers.

“Hmm,” Ellen hums. “Have you found it?”

Again, Cas hesitates.

“I don’t know. It’s difficult,” he says. “I suppose we don’t always know we’ve found what we’re looking for until we’re already in it.”

Ellen squints, crossing her arms.

“You say you’re looking for something. But the way you act? Seems more like you’re running from something.”

Cas pauses.

“Those aren’t mutually exclusive.”

Ellen seems to consider this, then nods once.

“Fair enough. Get some sleep, stranger. Your head will feel better in the morning.”

“Thank you,” Cas says quietly.

As Ellen disappears upstairs, Cas knows now is his chance to leave and never return.

He can’t bring himself to take it.

Cas awakes to the smell of burnt bacon and the sound of Sam and Dean bickering. For a moment, Cas forgets he’s in 2006 and assumes he must have dozed off on the couch watching another cowboy movie with Dean.

Reality hits him, unforgiving, in the chest.

“Rise and shine,” Jo says somewhere to his right. “Dumb and dumber are burning breakfast. Try it at your own risk.”

Cas drags himself to his feet. Frankly, he’s surprised he fell asleep at all. It seems his exhaustion got the better of him.

Curious at the amount of racket coming from the kitchen, Cas makes his way towards the blend of voices mixing in with the sizzling of a frying pan.

Sam and Dean are at the stove. Sam seems to be trying to take the spatula out of Dean’s hand, a cacophony of “Dean, you’re doing it wrong, just let me—” “Fuck you, I know how to make goddamn bacon, do you think I’m a caveman?” overlapping in the early afternoon air.

“Thought you were gonna sleep all day, the rate you were going at,” Bobby says. He’s sipping coffee, watching Sam and Dean’s fighting with obvious fondness written in the lines of his face.

“I’m sorry,” Cas says, embarrassed. “I don’t usually sleep in so late.”

“No worries. Not like you missed anything, other than these two fucking up bacon and—” Jo pauses, scrunching up her nose as she peers into another pan burning on the stove. “What is that supposed to be?”

“It’s pancakes!” Dean exclaims, clutching the spatula protectively to his chest, smacking away Sam’s hands as he grabs for it. He sounds offended. “You’re all a bunch of assholes, I’m a great cook!”

Cas does think Dean is, in fact, a great cook. That being said, the smell—

“Is something burning?” Cas says, frowning.

“Oh shit, my eggs!”

“I told you to watch them!”

“Oh yeah, ‘cause you’re Mr. Perfect, right?”

“Boys, please,” Ellen says as she leans against the kitchen counter, sipping coffee to try (and fail) to hide her smile. “Isn't it a little early for all this racket?”

“It’s almost noon, mom,” Jo says.

“Doesn’t mean I want to hear it.” Ellen turns to Bobby. “You gonna get them in line or not?”

Bobby scoffs and crosses his arms.

“And what makes you think they’ll listen to me?”

“They’re your boys. So you fix it.”

Bobby scoffs again but he looks almost embarrassed, too.

“Don’t know what you expect me to do,” Bobby says. “‘Sides, you’re the one that let ‘em near the stove. Even I know better’n that.”

“If I may,” Cas interrupts quietly. “I could make something, if you like. I’d like to thank you for your hospitality.” He pauses. “I fear I’m not much of a cook but I won’t set anything on fire.”

Jo gestures broadly to the kitchen.

“It’s all yours,” she says. “Can’t do worse than they did.”

Cas nods, biting back an amused smile. He steps around Sam and Dean—who are still arguing, unaware of everything going on around them—and gets to work making something he knows.

He wonders briefly as he’s searching through the cupboards whether it’s strange to make them a meal Dean taught him to make, then shakes away the thought. At least he knows they’ll like it.

Cas is confident in what he’s doing, not thinking anything of it, until Dean appears at his side, arms crossed, frown firmly in place.

“What’re you doing?”

Dean reaches a hand out towards the plates Cas spread out before him, and Cas automatically slaps it away. Dean blinks at him, surprised. Cas feels his face flush in embarrassment.

“It’s not done yet,” he says, his cheeks hot.

“Are you making peanut butter and jelly? For breakfast?” Dean asks.

“It’s noon,” Cas says defensively. His shoulders rise up to his ears and suddenly he’s wondering if this is somehow abnormal.

“I thought you said you were gonna cook something,” Jo chimes in.

“I said ‘make’,” Cas says. “I told you, I’m not a good cook. And everybody likes sandwiches.”

“Well, they certainly look more appetizing than Dean’s disaster of a breakfast,” Jo says, clearly biting back a smirk.

“Fuck you, my pancakes are coming out great!”

Ellen looks skyward, sighing heavily.

“Sandwiches are just fine. Thank you, Cas.”

“Hey, what about me?” Dean says, arms crossed. “I’m over here, slaving away to make all you ungrateful jerks an incredible breakfast, and what do I get? Nothing but disrespect!”

“Don’t be so dramatic,” Sam says, sounding amused. “Besides, you burnt the eggs and those pancakes are all runny.”

“Why do I even bother?”

“All right, that’s enough,” Bobby says. “Will you knuckleheads knock it off? Someone bring me something to eat. I don’t care what it is, so long as it's edible.”

“Here,” Cas says, beginning to pass out the sandwiches to everyone. Dean hesitates, peering at it suspiciously. Cas is caught somewhere between fond and offended.

He’s not your Dean, Cas reminds himself.

He’s still a Dean, though, and this Dean is as effortlessly charming as his own.

“Do you not want it?” Cas says as Dean continues to stare at the sandwich. Dean huffs then finally grabs it, biting into it angrily. Cas turns away, hiding his smile from the others.

Effortlessly charming, indeed.

Cas really means to leave that night. He swears he does.

He knows that the longer he stays, the harder it will be to leave. He’s spent the last three months completely alone; now, here, he’s surrounded by versions of those he loves and misses the most. How does someone bring themselves to walk away from something like that?

Still, Cas offers his thanks and stilted farewells. He can’t bring himself to say too much for fear of giving himself away. He keeps his emotions in check, and it works.

That is, until Bobby offers to give him a ride back to his own car. (Well, the car he stole.) It’s still at the warehouse they found each other in. Bobby says he’ll drive him there, drop him off, and let Cas be on his way.

That’s where it all falls apart.

Cloaked in the soft light of the setting sun as dusk falls over South Dakota, Bobby parks next to the Honda Civic, sitting exactly where Cas left it outside the warehouse.

It’s as he’s sitting there, realizing he’s supposed to be getting out of Bobby’s car now, that Cas realizes he can’t bring himself to move.

He knows as it’s happening the why of it; he laments the pain of it anyway. He can’t do anything right, not even leave.

Cas can feel Bobby’s gaze shift to him as he stays there, frozen in his spot. The steady thrumming of his heart grows faster and faster and the skin of his palms clams up. Tears sting his eyes and his vision blurs with them. He doesn’t wipe them away as they fall, can’t bring himself to even move his hands.

“You know,” Bobby begins slowly, his voice careful. “Ellen thinks you’re running from somethin’.”

Cas doesn’t trust his voice at that moment, can only bring himself to nod once.

“You gonna tell me what it is you’re running from?”

There are so many different things Cas could say to that, so many different answers he could give. He knows he’s going to be at least partially honest. As it is, when he opens his mouth, he’s still surprised by what comes out.

“My family,” Cas rasps. “They’re gone. My family is gone.”

“All of ‘em?” Bobby asks quietly.

“Yes,” Cas says, gasping in a shuddering breath. “I—I don’t—I don’t have anyone else. They’re gone and it’s—it’s just me now.” The tears come faster now and suddenly it’s all pouring out of his mouth and into the enclosed space of the car. “I was with my best friend and our son—for a long time. We were—we were so happy and now—now they’re gone and I’ll never see them again.”

Cas realizes as he’s saying it that he believes it to be true—because what other explanation is there?

Jack would have come by now if he could. He wouldn’t leave Cas like this—alone, afraid, with no way to get home and no one to help him. He wouldn’t ignore Cas’s calls unless it was literally impossible for him to get to Cas. Cas doesn’t know why the Empty spat him out into this different timeline, this different year, but it doesn’t matter, because Jack can’t get to him. He’s never going to see him again. He’ll never see any of them again.

His grief comes in an unrelenting wave. Sitting in silence next to Bobby, as the sky grows darker and darker, Cas lets himself break down in a way he hasn’t since all of this happened.

In the thrall of his mourning, the minutes blend together meaninglessly. Cas has no idea how much time passes before Bobby breaks the silence once more.

“Your boy—how old was he?”

“Four,” Cas says quietly. He knows it sounds misleading—Jack has never been a normal four year old—but it’s still true.

“And this friend of yers—you were raising him together?”

“We were,” Cas says softly. “We—we were happy. And I was—” Cas blows out a breath. “I was so in love with him.”

“Hunt gone wrong?” Bobby ventures.

“Yes,” Cas says. That it’s much more complicated than Bobby would ever believe is irrelevant. “I couldn’t stop it. I couldn’t protect them.”

“I never understood why,” Bobby says slowly. “Certain people die when others live. You drive yourself crazy with those kinda questions. Learned a long time ago, it’s better not to ask at all.”

“How?” Cas whispers. Bobby looks over at him, meeting his eyes then. There’s something very old and very tired in his gaze.

“Burying the people you love—it’s not something you come back from the same. ‘Specially when they die bloody. Way I see it, it ain’t about moving on. It’s about moving forward.” Bobby pauses. “Nothing’ll ever bring yer family back. I reckon you know that by now. But spending the rest of yer life feeling sorry for yourself ain’t honoring their memory.”

“Honor their memory,” Cas murmurs. “But I want—I want—” Cas cuts himself off.

He was never going to have what he wanted, anyway.

“I know,” Bobby says gently. “But you have a choice to make, son. You can either stay like y’are now. Or you can move forward.”

Cas breathes in deeply, calming the trembling of his hands. His tears have slowed now and his heartbeat is steadily returning to normal.

“Okay,” Cas says finally.

“Okay?” Bobby echoes. For the first time tonight, he sounds unsure.

“You’re right,” Cas says, then pauses. “I don’t suppose you still have room on your couch for tonight?”

“Well,” Bobby says, shrugging in a faux-casual manner. “Don’t see what difference one more night’ll make. It’s all yours.”

Cas knows in that moment, as Bobby turns them around and heads back to Singer Salvage Yard, that his only way of moving forward is staying put.

Cas isn’t sure what to expect when he and Bobby enter the home again together. Sam and Dean are bantering on the couch, a bowl of popcorn between them, while Ellen leans up against the kitchen counter with a beer and Jo stirs something in a pot at the stove.

When he steps through the front door, immediately all eyes fall on him. He watches the way their faces change upon noticing him; Ellen, her gaze steady and contemplative; Jo peering at him from the corner of her eye; Sam with the slightest concerned furrow to his brow; and Dean with his jaw set and eyes bright.

For a moment, they all stand in a tense silence, just looking at each other, before Bobby says, “And what are you chuckleheads looking at?” He tosses his car keys on the counter, looking for all the world like absolutely nothing is out of the ordinary.

Cas knows he told Bobby more than he realistically should have; while he kept the details vague, everything he said stemmed from a very painful truth. He wonders now, seeing the way the others track his movements through the room, whether Bobby will keep his secret or not.

“So,” Ellen says, her voice measured. “You staying another night?”

Cas meets her gaze and stands up taller, straightening his shoulders.

“I am,” he says evenly.

“And after that?” Jo says carefully. Here, Cas falters, biting his lip nervously.

“What is this, 20 questions?” Bobby says. “Lay off ‘im.”

When Ellen raises an eyebrow at him, Bobby stays firm.

“I said, lay off him,” Bobby repeats, his voice more serious than Cas has heard it before. “My call.”

There’s another tense moment where everyone is just staring, until—

“So, are we watching the movie or not?” Dean says.

“We are,” Jo sighs, turning off the stove. “Don’t play it without me.”

“Want to join us, stranger?” Ellen says, nodding towards the couch where the others are gathering. “Dean put on Tombstone.”

“Again,” Sam says pointedly.

“Hey, what’s wrong with Tombstone?” Dean says.

“Nothing, but you always choose it when it’s your turn.”

“Fuck off, this movie is great!”

“Yes, it is,” Cas cuts in quietly. “I’d love to watch it.”

And with that, the subject is dropped and they all settle in to watch the movie.

Later, after everyone has retired for the night, Cas quietly makes his way out of the house and into the junkyard. Standing beneath the stars, head tilted to the sky, Cas takes deep breaths. He knows what he has to do but he’s afraid.

There’s only one way to be sure, and he needs to be sure.

“Chuck,” Cas says, voice wavering. “Are you there?”

Cas pauses, studying his surroundings intently.

“I want to talk,” Cas tries again. “I know you put me here.” He doesn’t. “I know what you’re trying to do.” He doesn’t. “And it’s not going to work.” Oh, but it is.

Cas waits with bated breath, searching to see even the slightest change.

When still nothing changes, Cas takes a deep breath in, deep breath out. Chuck has always been a showman. He just wants a good scene.

Cas can give that to him.

“What, you want me to grovel?” Cas says, anger bubbling in the pit of his stomach. “You want me to beg? After all the hell you’ve put me through, do you really expect me to ask you for anything?”

The quiet humming of the Earth around him only serves to infuriate him more.

“What is there even left to say, Chuck? I don’t think there’s any part of me you haven’t ruined.” Cas swallows thickly. “I know you know I love Dean. I know that’s why you did this. Is this fun for you? To watch me suffer like this?”

The chirp of nighttime crickets and the groaning of old metal is the only answer Cas receives.

And he doesn’t want to sink to this level, he’d rather preserve his dignity, but he is well and truly out of options.

Cas closes his eyes against the quiet of the night and says, “Please. Please, Chuck. Just—take me back. I’ll—” Cas’s breath catches in his throat. “I’ll do anything. Please, just let me see him again.”

Cas waits. And waits. And waits.

Nothing.

All the air in Cas’s lungs leaves him in a whoosh. His legs tremble before giving out on him completely and he sinks to the soft ground, hands clenched white-knuckled into fists as he stands face-to-face with a truth he’s been avoiding for three months.

He’s stuck here. He’ll never go home again.

Chapter Text

The weeks following Cas’s decision to stay with the Winchesters are unremarkable in the way that all monumental decisions are at first. Cas knew in the moment that the peace wouldn’t last—and it didn’t. 

Cas has always known, on an instinctual level, that there would be consequences to his choice to stay. He’s found that any time he comes to a crossroads—where, one way lay the logical path, and the other way lay the unpredictable path, he typically will take the unpredictable path. And it always yields some type of consequence. Cas knows this and has made his peace with it. It’s just who he is.

However, had he known just how steep the price was, he would have left and never come back.

It starts like any ordinary hunt—the extraordinary ones typically do. A small nest of demons takes up residence in the south side of town—making deals and generally causing chaos. This is nothing Cas hasn’t done before. And while these versions of his friends aren’t as experienced with demons, he knows what they’re capable of and he trusts their instincts. 

Besides, Cas doesn’t have much of a choice. Despite how courteous they’ve been to him, Cas is all too aware that he is still a guest here. This is their home, not his, and he’s unsure if his continued stay is contingent upon his usefulness, and he’s too afraid of the answer to ask. So, he volunteers to help and saves all of them the embarrassment.

The hunt leads them to the southern border of Sioux Falls in the dead of night. Under the cover of the dark, the six of them make their way into an abandoned factory where, rumor has it, the demons have been staying. There’s five total, but they kept watch outside to track their comings and goings, and there should only be two inside now. They take them on, a few at a time, and wipe them out. Simple. Easy.

Except, it’s not.

Cas can’t say for sure how it happens because no matter how much he examines it play-by-play he doesn’t know, but there were more than two demons inside. In fact, there were much more than five; nine total, and against the six of them, it’s a losing battle.

Cas knows he can’t use his powers here. Even if the others weren’t around, he can’t risk drawing the attention of the angels. For all intents and purposes, he is human in this hunt, and a human against demons isn’t exactly a fair fight. However, Cas has always been the type to go down swinging. If he’s going to die here, he’s going to take as many demons as he can with him.

The worst of it comes near the end of the fight, and it comes from protecting Sam.

Cas can’t say for sure whether it’s so ingrained in him now to protect Dean’s brother or if it comes as an extension of loving Dean—loving Sam—but he does it without even thinking about it.

“Mom, there’s too many of them!” Jo shouts. They’ve been passing the demon blade back and forth but it isn’t enough—they’ve only managed to kill two of the nine. Bobby’s voice is raised, shouting out an exorcism, and the rest of them are relying on bullets to slow the demons down. It isn’t working.

“We gotta get the hell out of here,” Ellen grunts as she slashes one of the demons across the face with a blade. The blood spatters dark red onto her shirt. “Fall back!”

Cas only has knives the others have given him—one from Bobby with a curved blade and wooden handle, and one from Ellen with a hooked blade. He wields them in his fists now, face-to-face with two demons who are clearly enjoying watching him struggle.

He isn’t—is the thing. But he has to put on a show. He sees how the others are lagging, their movements wild and exaggerated as the exhaustion kicks in. He knows he can’t use his powers—unless someone is about to die, he can’t. It’s too risky. So he mimics the hunch of their shoulders and the furrow of their brows and thinks about how easily he could kill every single one of these demons if only he didn’t need to hide. If only it wouldn’t put him on the angels’ radar.

“Ellen’s right!” Bobby yells, splashing holy water onto another demon. “Everyone out! Back to the door!”

But the demons are blocking the door now and through the race of his heart and his heaving breaths, coated in demon blood and his own sweat, time slows down; that pinpoint, again, where everything changes.

Sam turns his back at exactly the wrong moment and Cas reacts before he thinks; he pushes Sam out of the way and one of the demon’s blades sinks deep into the meat of his upper right shoulder. He cries out more from the shock of being stabbed rather than the pain of it; it hurts, yes, but it’s still just a regular knife. Nothing can hurt him like an angel blade can, and angel blades haven’t reached Earth yet in 2006.

Still, he staggers. Sam turns to him now, his eyes wide and mouth dropping open in a mask of utter horror. Cas glances over his shoulder, grips the handle of the blade, and pulls it out with a grunt. He can feel blood run in thick rivulets down his back and he doesn’t know how to react. He stands, stock still, staring at the knife, while Sam reaches out for him.

“Sammy, come on!”

That’s Dean, pulling him away, and—God, there’s so much blood, way more than he thought there would be, and this isn’t good—this is the type of wound that kills people, and—

“Cas, you gotta move!” Jo shouts.

In that moment, Cas knows he has a decision to make. Sam is still reaching out for him even as Dean and the others are tugging him towards the door. He knows Sam has seen how deep the blade cut him. He’s not supposed to survive something like this—at the very least, it should phase him. And he has to protect his identity. These people and these demons think he’s a human.

And someone has to kill this goddamn nest.

So Cas lets himself fall to the ground. He’s not much of an actor but a stab wound like this would bring any man to his knees, so that’s what he does. He can see the realization spread across the others’ faces, and he knows what he needs to do now—he has a plan—so he calls out to them, “Go! Just go! Get out of here! Leave me!”

Cas clutches at the wound on his back for good measure, blood running heavy and thick between his fingers and down his arm.

“Like hell we are!” Bobby shouts, voice angry but his eyes wide in panic. “Get your ass up and get over here!”

For one heart-stopping moment, Cas is terrified they’ll refuse to leave them—terrified he’s going to get them killed—but luckily the demons don’t give them a choice. They drive the others out, back through the door, and Cas can hear them calling to him, and he savors the cadence of their voices one last time. He isn’t sure what’s going to happen after this, but with them gone, he can let himself go more than he could with an audience.

Cas can’t smite these demons like he wants to—that would draw too much attention and the angels would surely notice—but with no one around now, Cas can draw on some of his grace. Just a little—just enough to help him in this fight and send them back to where they came from.

The familiar thrum of calling on his grace, of feeling it hum inside his veins and seep out through his skin—it’s an age-old song he’s missed dearly. The rush of power, the reminder that he isn’t helpless and he isn’t weak—he can protect the people he cares for—it’s intoxicating. And to see the way the demons’ faces change as his eyes glow blue, it’s satisfying in a way nothing else is.

“I don’t appreciate,” Cas growls, grabbing the closest demon by the throat. “You hurting my friends.”

Because—that’s what they are at this point, right? It’s impossible, Cas knows, to completely stop comparing them to the versions of themselves from his time, but—still. They’re his friends. He doesn’t pray to Jack anymore, not like he did before. He doesn’t think Jack can hear him. He knows he can’t get back home, and he’s accepted that.

His life is here, now. Regardless of how transient this arrangement with the others is, this is the timeline and the universe he has found himself in, and it’s where he’s going to remain for the foreseeable future. And he doesn’t want to live in any world where the people he loves most are dead.

Cas shoves the demon to his knees; extends his free hand and holds the others back with only a thought. It’s been too long since he’s been able to fight like this, Cas thinks. Despite how his powers have been flickering in and out, Cas is still an angel through and through. This is in his blood. It’s the core of who he is.

Sending the demon, snarling and gasping for air in his grip, back down to hell sends a rush of adrenaline through Cas. Though exhaustion threatens to creep into his bones, he pushes it back. Calls on more of his grace and lets his instincts take over. He can do this.

One by one, Cas kills the demons with a meticulousness and a ruthlessness that let him lead the armies of heaven. His movements are led by muscle memory—the practiced ease of killing these vile creatures he’s come to loathe so much over the years with few exceptions, and he doesn’t think about it. He just wants them dead and to get back to his friends. He wants this hunt to be over.

Then, time slows again—that pinpoint again. And his entire world shifts.

The last demon drops to his feet, its soul wailing as it descends back to the pit. Cas heaves in breath after breath, clenching his hands into fists, reigning his grace back in. Smoothing it in under his skin, moving his head from side to side. Settling back into his human form.

Then, the slam of a door—more demons, of course there’s more demons. Cas turns to face them head-on. He gets as far as reaching back into his grace before he—stops. And stares. The approaching demons, the thick scent of blood and bile in the room, the slants of moonlight coming in through the windows, it all falls away because—there, right in front of him—he knows that face—

“Well, well, well, what do we have here?”

Alastair is exactly as Cas remembers him. Four more demons enclose him in a semi-circle, growling and huffing, but Cas’s eyes don’t leave Alastair for a second. An old rage reignites in him all at once; like stretching a sore muscle, like prodding a rotten tooth, the weight of his loathing settles over him like an embrace—or a chokehold. Memories of Dean’s anguish and torture wash over him in a wave and—and Cas is going to kill him. And he’s going to make him fucking suffer while he does it.

“Alastair,” Cas growls and Alastair’s expression shifts ever so slightly—the subtle intrigue of realizing Cas recognizes him.

Cas knows Alastair is no ordinary demon. At full power, a decade earlier, Cas had struggled going toe-to-toe with him. He doesn’t know how this Alastair differs from the one he fought—doesn’t even know what the hell he’s doing on Earth right now—but it doesn’t matter. The rage, the hatred, it’s all Cas can think about. His focus narrows. All that matters is making him suffer. All that matters is making him pay.

In his mind’s eye, Cas lets himself think of Dean—his Dean. Doing so these days typically brings him nothing but sadness but right now, Cas needs to if he’s going to survive this. Because even though his Dean is lost to him, even though he’s long gone, his Dean was his. No, they were never together and Dean hadn’t felt that way about him, but the imperfect beauty of his soul; his measured moments of tenderness; the simple delight of his smile and the exact cadence of his laugh, Cas held those pieces of Dean inside himself. Dean is a part of him still, even still. Dean was his. And Cas has always been protective of the things that belong to him.

Perhaps Cas couldn’t protect his Dean in a way that matters, but this? He can do this. He can make Alastair pay ten years too late.

With the depth of the loathing he feels towards Alastair and the rush of adrenaline spurred by this happenstance meeting, discarding of the other four demons is easy. Cas kills them without a thought and Alastair makes no moves to stop him or protect them. He keeps his gaze locked on Cas, eyes bright and fascinated. Cas doesn’t give a second thought to the possibility that the amount of power he’s using now could draw the attention of the angels. That doesn’t matter anymore.

When it’s just the two of them—when Cas is staring him down soaked in the blood of nearly a dozen demons—Alastair cocks his head to the side, considering him quietly. Thoughtfully.

“I know you,” Alastair states, and it’s not a question.

“You don’t,” Cas says, jaw set. “But I know you.”

“Wait, don’t tell me,” Alastair starts—and Goddamn, it’s the same slow drawl, the same calculated gaze from ten years past. “I killed someone you love and dragged them to my rack.”

“Yes,” Cas bites out, hands clenched into fists at his side. “You’re exactly like I remember you to be.”

“No,” Alastair says in a sing-song lilt. “No, that’s not right. We’ve never met. You? I would remember something like you.”

He should be afraid, Cas knows. He’s well aware of what Alastair is capable of and his level of skill. But somehow, in that moment, all Cas can bring himself to feel is disgust.

“I’m going to kill you,” Cas growls and Alastair’s face splits into a wide grin, his eyes manic.

“Oh, this is going to be fun,” he mutters.

After that, it all becomes a blur; a flurry of fists and Cas’s pulsing grace, eye-to-eye, Alastair’s taunting smirk; there’s a rhythm to their fighting and all Cas can think is that he should’ve done this before. He should’ve protected Dean sooner.

He should have done a lot of things.

In the heat of the fight, time moves thick like jelly and Cas’s world narrows down to the blood caked in the split of his knuckles and the grace seeping out through the cracks in his palms. His heart thuds loud in his ear; he can feel his own pulse through the thrumming of his blood.

In this in-between state—this temporary suspension of time—Cas also realizes, rather quickly, that this is a fight he cannot win.

It dawns on him the way such surreal things do, that he’s going to die like this. He’ll die alone, in the wrong year, in the wrong timeline, at the hands of a demon ten-years dead—a demon cosmically inconsequential in the grand scheme of the foes he’s faced. Everything he’s ever done—the life that he’s led, the people he’s loved—is all about to be rendered irrelevant in the face of his own demise. He’s staring oblivion in the face and it’s agony.

Cas has never felt as human as he does in that moment.

Cas staggers backwards; they’re not trading blows now so much as Cas is simply trying to keep his face from getting beaten in. His legs wobble before giving out completely and he lands hard on his knees.

Cas doesn’t even have time to say another word before Alastair knocks him unconscious.

When Cas comes to, he feels confusion, relief, then overwhelming dread, in that order.

Confusion because he’s alive; the relief for the same reason. The dread, because he knows Alastair, and if Alastair has chosen to keep him alive, his future must be bleak indeed.

“Rise and shine,” and—Christ, Cas has not missed the sound of his voice.

Cas takes a moment to get his bearings. Cracking open his eyes, Cas realizes quickly that not only has he been chained down, he’s surrounded by blood sigils. Cas subtly tests his own strength, tugging discreetly against the chains binding him. He’s tired—more tired than he has been in months. He burned through a lot of his grace fighting the demons and it took a toll on his body. He needs to recuperate, regain his strength.

Of course, that’s assuming he’ll live to see another sunrise. At the rate he’s going now, that’s not a very likely scenario.

“My, oh, my, look at you. What are you?”

There’s a sick sort of intrigue in Alastair’s tone. He’s crouching before Cas, blade held in one hand while he grips Cas’s face with the other. Cas forces himself to still, won’t let himself flinch as Alastair's blade hovers over his left eye.

“This skin,” Alastair murmurs. “Isn’t your skin. No, you’re under it. But you’re not a demon.”

Cas tries to think back, through the rush of fear, how much Alastair was aware of back in 2006—but finds he can’t remember. It’s been too long.

“How do I make you come out to play?” Alastair says. Cas’s breathing speeds up involuntarily as Alastairs drags the blade across the skin of Cas’s cheek; he squeezes his eyes shut, heart pounding.

“It doesn’t matter what you do to me,” Cas says through gritted teeth. Blood trickles down his face in a wet caress. “You can’t kill me.”

Cas isn’t actually sure of that—Alastair may not have an angel blade but Cas isn’t as strong as he used to be. And he knows that if Alastair is anything, he’s creative. God only knows what tricks he has up his sleeve.

“Kill you? No, no, no,” Alastair croons. “You’re no good to me dead. I want to peel back your layers and see what makes you tick.”

In the haze of blood and fear, his dread sitting heavy as a lead weight in his stomach, Cas thinks maybe it would have been better if Chuck had just left him in the Empty.

Later—when blood trickles red like red wine down the contours of his body, dripping down sweat-slick skin and soaking into damp cloth—later, when the others ask, Cas won’t be able to remember how it happens. If Cas had any faith left in God, he’d have no choice but to think it was a miracle. As it is, Cas supposes he just got very, very lucky.

When Cas’s body is a tapestry of blood and exposed tissues and the salt of his tears—when Alastair’s amused, subtle smirk smooths out into a thin line, clearly annoyed—Cas is sure his time is up. He had his fun torturing Cas; now he’s going to find some way to kill him. And when Cas dies in this Godforsaken factory and the imprint of his wings scorches itself into the ground, he’ll find out at last that Cas is an angel.

But that’s not what happens.

Cas tracks Alastair’s movements with wild eyes; though his limbs are heavy with agony and exhaustion, he’s all too aware of where Alastair may sink his blade into him next. Cas doesn’t think he has any exposed skin that hasn’t been sliced into at this point. He doesn’t even have the energy to scream anymore.

Instead, Alastair sets the knife down.

His jaw is clenched and his lips are pressed into a thin line. He seems almost annoyed, as if Cas’s lack of cooperation through his torture is no more than an inconvenience for him. Cas wonders, distantly, at what point does Alastair stop enjoying someone’s suffering and begin simply enduring it?

Whatever that point is for Alastair, Cas knows he’s passed it.

“Just kill me,” Cas says and—his voice comes out in a broken croak and blood sits thick as molasses in his mouth.

“If you won’t show me,” Alastair mutters, his gaze sharp. “Then I’ll just have to take a look myself.”

At first, Cas doesn’t understand—he doesn’t understand but Alastair is placing his hands around Cas’s head and then—

It dawns on him, the split second before Alastair looks into his mind, what exactly is about to happen. Hope—intoxicating, euphoric hope—bursts in his chest and Cas realizes in that moment that he knows exactly how he’s going to kill Alastair.

He only has a second—hell, less than a second, just a fraction of a second—to do what he needs to do. He won’t fuck up this chance.

When Alastair probes at the boundaries of his mind, Cas doesn’t fight it; he lets the barriers fall away. Opens his mind and reaches into his grace—lets it all come through. If Alastair wants to peer inside the mind of an angel, Cas is going to show him everything.

Alastair reaches into his head, forceful, violent, and Cas lets his thoughts fall open easy as the petals of a rose; blooming, flowering, folding into one another effortlessly. The rush of memories—the contents of his head, which would kill a mortal within moments—flows from Cas and into Alastair quicker than Alastair can stop it.

The effect is almost instantaneous.

Alastair falls back, mouth agape in a silent scream, limbs frozen in place. Cas yanks against the chains binding him with all his might, reaching into the very last vestiges of his grace to fuel his strength, and with one great pull, snaps the chains apart. He rises to his knees and in one swift moment, takes Alastair’s face between his hands and channels all of his grace like a funnel into his skull.

The shrieking of Alastair’s soul echoes throughout the factory like a song as the light of Cas’s grace blots out his surroundings. And just like that, Alastair falls limp to the ground, dead.

All of Cas’s energy leaves him in one fell swoop and he collapses back to the filthy ground. Cas lays still, his cheek against the dirt floor, blood sticky on his skin.

Every good deed, it seems, comes with a price. Cas can’t bring himself to regret smiting Alastair but he knows he likely only has moments before the angels come to kill him. There’s no way using his grace like that didn’t tip them off to his presence on Earth.

Cas’s eyes shift from the burnt shell of Alastair’s corpse, to the scattered bodies of the demons face-down around him. Cas chuckles ruefully to himself. At least he took this goddamn nest out with him.

And at least his friends got away.

So Cas waits for his inevitable demise by the hands of the angels.

And waits. And waits.

He has no solid grasp on time—not since Alastair began torturing him—but at least an hour has to have passed. They should’ve been here by now.

Is it possible the angels didn’t notice him using his grace on Earth? Or did they simply not care enough to come see for themselves what caused it? Could he really be that lucky?

It’s as Cas lays there, growing more restless by the minute, that he hears it: the sound of voices.

Even through his exhaustion and his stress, Cas’s ears perk and he listens closer—not just any voices.

The panic that surges through Cas at that moment gives him a burst of energy he didn’t think it was possible to have. Alongside the voices, comes the rapid patter of footsteps, and Cas knows they’re close. Less than a minute away.

Cas doesn’t know what will happen to his grace after this, but he doesn’t have the luxury or the time to stop and consider the pros and cons. Using one last surge of grace, Cas sends all the dead demons away with just a thought—really, he transports them to the middle of the Egyptian desert, where they will be neither found nor disturbed, but that’s besides the point. With the exception of the two that the others killed, he wipes every trace of their existence clean.

And just in time, too. In his periphery, as Cas is collapsing in on himself, bleary-eyed and jelly-limbed, he can see his friends burst through the factory doors, guns blazing. If he had the energy, he would cry out of sheer relief.

Somehow, someway, against all odds: Cas is saved.

“Cas? Cas!”

Sam is the first one to reach him. The others are close at his heels, but it’s Sam—and then Dean—who are the first faces Cas sees after his ordeal. The tears that immediately sting his eyes can’t be helped. He’s so, so grateful to see them again.

“Holy shit,” Sam chokes out, eyes wide in apparent horror. Cas doesn’t need a mirror to know he doesn’t look good right now. “Bobby! We need some help over here!”

And there—gentle hands on his shoulders, carefully turning him face-up. Cas groans involuntarily. His body is one raw, exposed nerve at this point. Alastair had done plenty of damage with his blade before he’d invaded Cas’s mind. Cas knows that, were he human, he would probably be on the brink of death right now.

“Cas, it’s Bobby. Can you hear me?”

Cas doesn’t remember closing his eyes, but when he opens them, Bobby is kneeling before him, his face drawn in worry.

“I can hear you,” Cas whispers. He knows he should try to stand—he knows he’s scaring them—but he’s just so tired. And he’s spent the last several hours waiting to die.

“We’re gonna get you outta here, okay, son?”

“Okay,” he says.

It’s painful—Cas can’t pretend it’s anything but. They all hoist him up together and he limps out of the factory, eyelids drooping and limbs heavy.

“What the hell happened to him?” Sam says somewhere to his left.

“Demons,” Cas mutters. He doesn’t feel good about lying but he doesn’t have a choice. “They left me for dead.”

“Jesus,” Sam says and Cas wonders if Sam blames himself for this. Knowing him, he probably does. “Why would they do something like this?”

“Because they’re demons, Sam,” Dean says and—oh, Cas hasn’t heard him sound like that in—ever, actually. Not this Dean. He’s heard his Dean sound like that before, but never this one.

They lay Cas out in the backseat of the Impala and Cas breathes in the familiar scent of her leather seats. It’s been too long, Cas thinks. She still smells like home. Smells like Dean.

Cas drifts off to the lull of her engine.

Cas awakes in a much more violent manner than he fell asleep. He sits bolt upright with a gasp, the incisions along his torso protesting at the movement. He groans, wincing as some of the cuts reopen. The stench of blood lingers around him like a fog.

“Woah, easy, tiger,” Dean says and—right, he’s safe. His friends found him. It’s over. He survived.

“Come on, Cas, let’s get you inside,” Sam says softly.

And so, with the help of the others, Cas manages to limp his way back into Bobby’s house. Initially, he heads towards the couch, but Bobby shakes his head and nods towards a closed door—Sam’s room, Cas realizes.

“I’ll stay with Dean—it’s fine,” Sam says quietly. “But you need to lay down on an actual bed, Cas.”

Cas doesn’t have the energy to argue and he lets them lead them to the—admittedly very comfortable—bed in the guestroom Sam’s been staying in.

“Jo, get the first aid kit,” Ellen says and Jo hurries out of the room, her face caught in a perpetual frown. Cas wonders what he looks like right now, to make them look at him like that.

“We’re gonna get you cleaned up, stranger,” Ellen says, and her voice is gentler than Cas has ever heard it.

It’s as Cas is laying there, motionless on the bed, that it occurs to him that this is exactly what he’s been trying to avoid. He doesn’t want to have to depend on these people. He doesn’t want them to get too close. And yet—

What’s his alternative? He’s hurt—worse than he’s been in a long time—and he has nowhere else to go.

Against his better judgment, Cas lets them clean and dress his wounds.

Late that night—when Cas’s body is more bandage than skin and he’s lying beneath the quilted covers—a soft knock sounds at Cas’s door.

“Come in,” Cas calls out.

Cas isn’t sure what he’s expecting but he’s still surprised when Dean steps into the room, looking oddly sheepish as he wrings his hands together.

“Hey,” he says softly. “I wasn’t sure if you were still up.”

“I can’t sleep,” Cas says, and it’s true.

“You in pain?”

“No, that’s not it,” Cas says. “I’m just—thinking.”

Cas hesitates. Dean’s having trouble meeting his eye, his gaze flitting to random spots around the room.

“Dean,” Cas starts. “Is…everything alright?”

“Yeah,” Dean says, but he doesn’t look it. “I just—Sammy told me what you did for him. I mean, shit, man, you took a fucking knife to the back for him. He feels real bad about what happened—with the demons, I mean.”

“That wasn’t his fault,” Cas says automatically. “I—I don’t fault him for it, Dean. I hope he knows that.”

“He does,” Dean says, then pauses. “I wanted to thank you. I’ve never been real good at—y’know—” Dean gestures vaguely, then huffs, seemingly frustrated. “But it meant a lot to me, you protecting him. Not everybody would do what you did for someone they barely know.”

Part of Cas just aches at that.

I do know Sam, Cas wants to say. I know Sam, and I know you. I know you, Dean Winchester.

In the early morning hours, crippled by the pain of his wounds and missing his family dearly, it comes so close to all spilling out. He can—he can tell Dean the truth, he knows. Dean will never believe him but at the very least it will all be out there—no more hiding, no more secrets. He has so many at this point that he can’t even keep track of them.

But Cas also knows what will happen if he confesses everything. And he doesn’t want to be alone.

“He’s just a kid,” Cas says instead. “You don’t have to thank me, Dean. And you don't—owe me anything. Either of you.”

“We weren’t gonna leave you there,” Dean blurts out. “I just—I know it took us a minute, but I swear, man, we weren’t just gonna leave you to—”

“Dean,” Cas interrupts firmly. Dean quiets, that sheepish look returning. His cheeks flush and he rubs at the back of his neck awkwardly. “I know that. It’s okay. You don’t have to explain it to me.”

“Right,” Dean says, voice halting. “Sorry, I, uh—”

“Why don’t you sit down,” Cas says gently. Dean hesitates then perches on the edge of Cas’s—well, Sam’s, technically—bed.

“I’m not good at this,” Dean says again, quieter.

“Good at what?”

“Y’know—feelings, or whatever.”

Cas snorts softly at that. That is not news to him.

“Neither am I,” Cas says. “I’m learning, I suppose.”

Cas shifts in bed to face Dean more fully, his face screwing up as his wounds smart against the bedsheets.

“You want me to get you some more pain meds?”

“I’m alright,” Cas says with a sigh. The meds hadn’t done anything, anyway, not with Cas still being an angel—but turning them down would have been suspicious. “I’m just—tired.”

“Is there, y’know—someone you want me to call for you? Family or somethin’?”

“I think you know, Dean,” Cas says quietly. “That I don’t have anyone. That’s why I’m here.”

“Yeah, I know,” Dean says, not meeting his eyes. “‘S okay, I get it.”

Cas studies Dean silently, the way he fidgets with his fingers in a nervous tic Cas hasn’t seen before. He has to remind himself that he doesn’t know this Dean like he knows his Dean. It’s hard to guess what may be going on inside his head.

“You seemed surprised,” Cas says slowly. “That I protected Sam. Can I ask why?”

Dean shrugs in an offhand manner but Cas can see the building line of tension in his shoulders, his jaw clenched and his eyes distant.

“Not everybody would do that,” Dean repeats.

“You would,” Cas says. Dean looks at him then, his brow furrowed.

“What?”

“You would,” Cas says again. “So would Sam, and so would Bobby, and so would Ellen and Jo. You’re hunters. You protect people. That’s what you do.” Cas pauses. “You showed me kindness when I had nothing. You’ll never know how much—how much that means to me.”

Cas can feel the stubborn stinging of tears in his eyes but he blinks them away. He doesn’t want to cry in front of Dean, not like this.

“You know, you don’t really—” Dean cuts himself off, tries again. “You don’t talk about yourself much, you know? You’re kind of a hard guy to read.”

“I’m sorry,” Cas says automatically and Dean frowns. “I’m not—well, I suppose I’ve never been much good at making friends.”

“Neither have I,” Dean says quietly. “Look, I know you said we don’t owe you nothing or whatever but—I want you to know that I don’t take it lightly, what you did. So thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Cas says because he doesn’t know what else to say in that moment.

“We can try, you know,” Dean says and Cas squints at him.

“Try what?”

“To be friends,” Dean says. “You don’t have to be a stranger, man.”

Cas fights against a fresh wave of tears, not wanting to scare Dean off.

“How?” Cas says quietly.

“It doesn't have to be complicated,” Dean says. “Let’s start simple, like—I dunno, what’s your favorite color?”

“My—favorite color?” Cas parrots, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. Dean huffs and rolls his eyes, crossing his arms.

“What, you got a better idea, asshole?”

“Green,” Cas says, unbearably fond. “My favorite color is green. What’s yours?”

“Well,” Dean says, rubbing at the back of his neck. “I never really thought about it before.”

“You brought it up,” Cas points out, just to annoy him. It’s successful and Dean huffs again.

“Alright, smart guy, we get it.”

“Favorite food?” Cas suggests instead.

“Gee—burgers, maybe? Can’t go wrong with a burger and a beer.”

Cas has to bite back his smile.

“What about you?”

“Peanut butter and jelly,” Cas says.

“Well, that explains why you make it so much.”

“It’s a good meal, Dean.”

“I don’t know if I’d call PB&J a meal. But you do make it great. Everybody always puts too much jelly. You put just the right amount.”

Because I make it the way you taught me, Cas thinks. And I like it how you like it.

“I’m glad to hear that,” Cas says instead, just enjoying seeing Dean smile like that.

“Why’d you start hunting?” Dean asks.

The smile is still there but it’s fading at the edges. Cas knew this question would come eventually from one of them. Even still, he feels unprepared for it.

Some version of the truth is probably best, Cas decides.

“I’ve always hunted,” Cas says, then hesitates. “You could say it was a—family business. I did it because my family did. At some point, I suppose I realized that I didn’t know what I’d do if I were to stop. It’s—it’s all I really know at this point.”

“Yeah,” Dean whispers. “I get that.”

Dean goes quiet then, his gaze distant.

“Is it the same for you?” Cas asks, as if he doesn’t already know.

“Yeah, same thing,” Dean says gruffly. “Family business. And—well, you know how that goes.”

“Have you ever wanted to do something different?” Cas says quietly.

“Eh,” Dean shrugs but it looks forced. “Used to wanna be a firefighter. But other than that, I never really—I guess I never let myself think about it.”

It’s so unusual for Cas to see Dean shy like this. But he’s looking at Cas in this hesitant, guarded way—he knows what it means to Dean for him to have protected Sam. But he’s not used to living in a world where his protecting Sam is something other than natural—something other than utterly expected.

“What about you?” Dean says. “You ever wanted to do something else?”

“Yes,” Cas says. He holds Dean's gaze, the moment feeling fragile somehow. “I wanted to stop. I was going to.”

“Why didn’t you?”

Cas swallows thickly, his throat feeling tight and his eyes hot.

“Because—because I lost the person I wanted to retire with.”

“Oh,” Dean says, and—it kills Cas, it hurts in a way he can’t articulate, that Dean has no idea how deep that sentiment goes for him. “Sorry to hear that.”

Cas doesn’t know how to respond to that so he doesn’t say anything. Pesky tears are building on his lashline and he drops Dean’s gaze, rubbing at his eyes. He’s embarrassed and tired and in pain and he misses Dean. Dean’s right in front of him and he—he misses him.

“I’m sorry,” Dean says suddenly. “I didn’t mean to—to pry, or whatever.”

“You’re not,” Cas says, scrubbing a tired hand down his face. He can feel his blood hot in his cheeks. “Forgive me, Dean, I’m—I think I’m just tired. I’m not usually this emotional.”

“‘S okay, man. You went through a lot today,” Dean says. “I’ll let you rest.”

When Dean gets up to leave, a strange sense of panic surges through Cas—he doesn’t want Dean to go. He’s enjoyed speaking to him again. It’s been so long since he’s sat down and had a regular conversation with him and he—misses it. He misses Dean’s friendship more than anything.

“Wait,” Cas blurts out, then clamps his mouth shut. He knows his blush is getting worse.

“Yeah?” Dean says, looking at him expectantly.

“I just—” Cas cuts himself off, shakes his head. “Never mind. It’s not important.”

“What is it? It’s okay, you can tell me.”

“It’s nothing,” Cas insists. “I’m being stupid. Please ignore me, Dean.”

“Look, man,” Dean says. “I’m worried, okay? I mean, you nearly died today. Whatever it is, I’m sure it’s not stupid.”

Cas reluctantly meets Dean’s gaze. His voice is earnest and his eyes kind, but this is still uncharted territory for Cas. And he doesn’t want to scare Dean away.

“I was just—” Cas licks his lips, taking a deep breath. “I just wanted to say I’ve enjoyed it—speaking to you, I mean. I wouldn’t mind doing it again. If you’d like.”

Dean quirks a small but genuine smile at him.

“Yeah, sure, man. God knows I don’t have that many people to talk to. Other than my brother, but he can be a total brat.”

“You love Sam,” Cas says, eyebrow raised. Dean rolls his eyes but Cas can see right through it.

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. The kid gets on my nerves, is the point.”

“That’s what brothers are for,” Cas says. “Thank you for checking on me, Dean. I appreciate it.”

“‘S nothing,” Dean says, rubbing at his neck again. It’s cute, Cas thinks, when he does that.

“Good night,” Cas says, because if he doesn’t, he knows he’s going to say something embarrassing, like asking Dean to stay with him.

“Night, Cas,” Dean says. He sends Cas one last smile before leaving the room, closing the door shut softly behind him.

Cas falls asleep that night thinking of the green of Dean’s eyes and the curve of his smile.

Chapter Text

The first two weeks that follow Cas saving Sam in that hunt are hazy. He spends the first few days sleeping off his injuries; while he could theoretically use his grace to speed up his healing, he doesn’t want to raise suspicion. Besides, his friends don’t give him much of a choice to bear this on his own; something changes after the hunt, enough so that Cas notices it. While protecting Sam is nothing new to Cas, it’s new to them, and he realizes rather quickly that it’s not something they think of lightly. It’s loyalty, Cas realizes. He hadn’t noticed its absence until its presence was borderline overwhelming.

It looks a little different with each of them, Cas learns. Sam himself seems to carry a guilt that Cas does his best to assuage; he doesn’t blame Sam and he certainly doesn’t want Sam blaming himself. Cas thinks back to what he knows of Sam’s upbringing, before they met; he knows how Sam’s always thought of himself—his branding as a monster, as something other. It churns Cas’s stomach to think that Sam doesn’t view himself as someone worthy of protecting—especially seeing as this Sam is so young and so innocent.

Bobby, for his part, is protective, but not in the way he was in Cas’s timeline. Back home, Bobby and Cas were on different footing, and his Bobby saw him more as an extension of Sam and Dean; he met Bobby through his connection to Dean, and Cas knows that influenced the way his Bobby viewed him. In this timeline, with Cas looking very different from how he looked when he met his Bobby—looking older—Bobby seems to view him more as an equal. The Bobby from his time respected him, yes, but he also offered guidance and kindness in a much different way. This Bobby is still older than the age Cas figures he appears as, but not by much. It’s a different dynamic, is the point, and it takes some getting used to.

Ellen’s respect has that same difference, Cas has found. So does Jo. Jo defers to him in the same way she defers to Bobby and Ellen; he realizes that, in her eyes, he’s more of an authority figure than an equal, and he’s not sure what to do with that. At the very least, she’s kind to him and it seems she finally trusts him, but it’s still strange for Cas.

And Dean—Dean is different, too. Cas has never seen himself as anything more than Dean’s equal; in many ways, he’s not even that. He knows his Dean thought highly of him for the most part—certainly more than he’s ever deserved or earned—but this Dean isn’t going through the same changes in opinion as his Dean. This Dean knows him as a hunter, first and foremost, not a monster; this Dean has only ever seen him do good. This Dean hasn’t bore witness to his challenges of faith and shifting identities; this Dean only knows his loyalty. It feels almost unfair, in a way—it feels deceitful. Cas has worked hard to get where he is, but that doesn’t change the fact that so much of that work is because of Dean, and this Dean will never know that.

It’s in this way that Dean admiring him feels almost wrong or unearned. It hurts him, even now, to lie to these people about who he is, but he doesn’t know what alternative there is. He knows telling them he’s an angel is out of the question but—

He considers it, in those precious weeks following that hunt. He thinks through the possibilities, how they may react; in the same way that these versions of his friends know very little about him, he knows little about them, too. He saw what they were like when they first met him in his own timeline, and that didn’t go great. They tried to kill him in the very beginning.

He knows they can’t actually physically hurt him but—Cas doesn’t have anything else. And that’s the main difference here.

Before, back in his time, he had nothing to lose when he came to Earth. He thought little of the Winchester’s opinion of him. He felt nothing, he loved nothing, and he wanted for nothing. He was barely a person.

But now—now, all he has are these people. He’s stuck in this timeline, likely for the rest of his life, and he cares about what they think of him. He doesn’t want to be alone. More than anything, he fears losing them.

Risking what they think of him—that’s a risk Cas isn’t sure he’s willing to take.

With Dean’s newfound respect of Cas, comes another change, one Cas is glad for—and that’s Dean’s trust.

Cas gets his first real glimpse of it—enough to identify it as what it is—about a week after the hunt. It’s late at night and Cas is sitting on Bobby’s front porch, under the stars. He doesn’t do much moving around these days—he has to maintain appearances and healing is exhausting work—so he finds himself often sitting on the stoop to at least get some fresh air. This night, Dean joins him.

“How are you feeling?” Dean asks.

“I’m alright,” Cas says. “Just tired.”

“Makes sense. You gotta take it easy while you heal.”

“I suppose I’ve never been much good at—staying still. I’m not used to taking it slow, to be honest.”

“Yeah,” Dean says, and he’s got a small smile on his face now. “I get that.”

Cas glances down and—Dean is toying with the amulet around his neck. Cas thinks back to a decade before, back when he was still getting to know Dean—when they were friends but not best friends. Asking Dean for the amulet in his search for God. Next to the leather jacket that Dean wears, even in the summer heat, Cas thinks it’s one of the few possessions that Dean has cared enough to hold onto for so long. He thinks briefly of his trenchcoat—it’s packed away with his other clothes. Part of him shies away from the thought of wearing it again. In many ways, it feels like a relic of the past. Maybe it’s not who he is anymore, or maybe he just doesn’t know how to let it be when so much of his life is cloaked in secrecy now.

“You can ask, you know,” Dean says, huffing out a laugh. Cas tears his eyes away, cheeks flushing.

“I’m sorry, Dean,” Cas says. “I—I didn’t mean to stare. I just—”

“‘S okay,” Dean says. “Really.”

“I assume there’s a story there,” Cas says, as if he doesn’t already know it.

“Yes and no,” Dean says. “I mean—it was a gift.”

“Oh?” Cas says, and—he isn’t sure if Dean will get into it, but he pauses—gives Dean the choice to either change the subject or expand.

“Yeah,” Dean says, his eyes getting distant, as if lost in some past memory. “When I, uh—when I was younger, it was just me and Sam a lot. He got it for me, one Christmas, when we were kids. I dunno—it’s kinda stupid, I guess.”

“It’s not stupid at all,” Cas says quietly, then hesitates. “It’s a gift. You keep those.”

“Yeah,” Dean mutters, rubbing at the back of his neck.

“Why do you do that?” Cas asks before he can stop himself. Dean looks over at him, his brow furrowed.

“Do what?”

“Get embarrassed,” Cas says. “It’s not embarrassing, you know—to love your family.”

If anything, Dean flushes darker. He looks away, not meeting Cas’s eyes. Cas curses himself—it’s difficult, to remember that this Dean doesn’t know him that well yet. It’s hard to find the line, where each boundary is.

“I’m sorry,” Cas says softly. “I wasn’t trying to—” Cas huffs, cutting himself off. “Forgive me, Dean. I wasn’t trying to make you uncomfortable.”

“You apologize a lot, you know that?” Dean says. Cas risks a glance at him and—Dean’s face is still flushed, but he’s got a soft smile pulling at his lips.

“Sorry,” Cas says automatically.

“Don’t be,” Dean says, then pauses. “It’s not you, man, I’m just, uh—not used to talking about this stuff, I guess.”

“It seems like you have a lot of people who love you,” Cas points out.

“Well, sure,” Dean says. “But that’s different. I’ve known Bobby my whole life. And Ellen and Jo—I don’t know, we mostly talk about hunts. It’s easier that way. I dunno if you’ve noticed, but I’m not exactly the type of guy who talks about his feelings all the time.”

“I know,” Cas says gently. “I’m not trying to push. I’ve been told that I—am not great at reading social cues. I try, though.”

“Pssh,” Dean says. “Fuck social cues. ‘Sides, you’re a hunter. We’re not exactly the most talkative bunch.”

“I don’t know,” Cas muses, biting back a smile. “I’ve been told sometimes I don’t know when to bite my tongue.”

“You? Really?”

Dean sends him a disbelieving look and Cas shrugs casually.

“Dude, you like, never talk.”

“I talk,” Cas says defensively.

“Uh huh,” Dean says. “And—are other people actually around when you do?”

“Fuck off,” Cas laughs and—like this, it’s easy to forget—that this Dean isn’t his Dean. Laughing together, spending quiet moments together—it’s nice. It’s what Cas has been missing.

“Hey, don’t worry about it, man,” Dean says. “You know, I hear people talk to themselves more in old age.”

“Excuse me?” Cas exclaims and—wait, he might actually be offended now. “How old do you think I am, Dean?”

“Uh…” Dean squints at him, seemingly assessing. “Gee, I dunno—like, fifty or something?”

That’s—actually generous, given Cas’s real age, but Dean thinks he’s a human. Cas realizes he hasn’t paid too much attention to how he’s been aging—it’s never been much of a concern. If anything, he’s enjoyed it—growing older with Dean. Even if he never said so to his Dean, he liked it—the thought of them getting older together.

“I don’t look that old,” Cas insists anyway.

“I didn’t say you looked bad,” Dean says. “I just said you looked old.”

“I thought you were supposed to respect your elders.”

“For fuck’s sake, Cas—”

“Fuck you, I look great for my age.”

“I never said you didn’t!”

Cas huffs but Dean is smothering his laughter with the back of his hand. He wants to be mad but—the flush across Dean’s cheeks, the way it makes his freckles stand out—he can’t bring himself to be. He knows Dean is only joking, anyway.

“Just wait until you’re my age,” Cas scolds, but he can’t keep the fondness out of his voice. “See how you look when you’re fifty, and then try to judge me.”

Dean laughs again next to him and—Cas stops. He realizes that—he doesn’t actually know what Dean will look like at fifty.

The grief hits him like a tidal wave all at once—because last he saw his Dean, he was forty-one. That’s all he got to see—that’s as far as he was afforded. He knew Dean from twenty-nine to forty-one, he got those twelve years and—nothing more. He’ll never know what his Dean will look like, ten years from now, when he reaches the halfway point of his life. He doesn’t know whether he’ll have gray hairs, if the lines of his face will grow deeper—will his freckles fade, or will they still peek through?

The smile falls from Cas’s face and he feels immobilized. Sitting on the porch, with this younger version of the love of his life next him, Cas can feel his grace crying out for Dean—for his Dean. That dream he had, of growing old with Dean—the two of them together, in whatever form that would come in—he’ll never have it.

There are tears stinging at his eyes before he can help it and Cas feels sudden disgust with himself and his own actions, that he can’t quite pinpoint the origin of. Is it wrong of him—is it selfish of him—to have sought Dean out like this? To enjoy him in his youth, when he knows he’ll never be able to revel in his aging like he wanted? His Dean is gone and now he’s—he’s latching onto this other version. Is Dean cursed to know him in every timeline? Is Cas destined to love him in every timeline?

“Hey,” Dean says, and his voice is different now—surely he’s seen the tears Cas is trying to fight back. “Are you okay?”

“Growing older is a privilege,” Cas says, his voice shaking. “It’s a privilege and—it’s one not many people get, in this line of work. I just—that matters, to me. I—I haven’t really thought about that before. Until now.”

“I know,” Dean says quietly. “Shit, Cas, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“No,” Cas interrupts. “You didn’t—you didn’t do anything wrong, Dean. Forgive me. I wasn’t trying to—” Cas cuts himself off, unsure how he could even finish that sentence.

“You gotta stop apologizing, man,” Dean says softly. “I’m not—I’m not gonna judge you, or anything. I mean, I know I can act like an asshole sometimes, but I swear I’m not.”

“I don’t think that of you, Dean,” Cas says, looking over at him—he catches Dean’s eyes, because this is important. “I’ve never thought that. You’re—very kind. And I appreciate it—your kindness.”

Cas wipes at his eyes, suddenly embarrassed.

“I suppose I’ve gotten sentimental as I’ve gotten older,” Cas admits. “At some point, after burying so many people—friends, family, lovers—it’s difficult to ignore. It’s difficult not to wonder—what they would be like, were they still here. How they would change—how they would look. And how your life would be different, were they still in it.”

“Yeah,” Dean whispers. “I get that.”

Cas studies him quietly—Dean has that distant look in his eye again, his brow furrowed. He still looks beautiful, under the soft glow of the stars—he’s always beautiful. His soul pulses within him—it’s grief, Cas recognizes it. His Dean’s soul would hurt in the same way.

Suddenly, the moment feels fragile—feels significant. Dean’s shoulders are hunched up to his ears and his eyes are glassy, and Cas—he wants to make it better. He hadn’t meant for Dean to hurt, too.

And—maybe Cas is selfish. Maybe Dean’s life would be better if he wasn’t in it, but Cas realizes—that doesn’t really matter now. He can’t bring himself to leave here, to leave these people behind. He doesn’t want to. And if he’s here—if he’s going to stay—then he wants to be someone they can lean on.

He’s going to love Dean, regardless of whether Cas lets him get close—if he knows anything, he knows that. And he doesn’t want to live in a world where Dean can’t come to him when he’s hurting.

“You know,” Cas begins carefully. “If there’s anything I’ve learned about grief, it’s that—it’s easier. When you’re not doing it alone. It doesn’t make it better, not all the way, but—it’s easier.”

Dean looks over at him and—his face is guarded now, hesitant. But Cas thinks he looks hopeful, too.

“Yeah?” Dean says.

“Yeah,” Cas says, a soft smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “But hey, what do I know? After all, I’m just an old man.”

Dean laughs quietly, shaking his head, and Cas revels in it—small victories. The pulse of Dean’s soul eases, and settles.

This is what he’s here for, Cas decides. To see Dean smile like that—to see the glow of his soul. To ease his pain, no matter how slight. To tell a stupid joke and share a smile.

Cas’s life has always felt most fruitful when he’s feeling with Dean.

The first time Cas tells the others about himself, it’s intentional.

It’s a calculated risk, really. Before Cas decides whether he’s going to to tell them the truth about himself—about being an angel—he’s going to take smaller risks. Letting them get closer, letting them know more. Right now, the only person who knows enough to hurt him is Bobby; his confession in Bobby’s car, the night he was supposed to leave and couldn’t bring himself to. Bobby knows two very important things about him: he had a best friend he was in love with, and he had a son. He knows they’re both gone—and maybe they aren’t in the way that Bobby thinks, but the end result is the same: Cas has no one. No one, now, except his new friends.

As far as Cas knows, Bobby has kept that secret. At the very least, if he’s told the others, they certainly haven’t brought it up to him. Cas may not know this Bobby that well yet, but he honestly doesn’t see Bobby sharing that information. It feels too personal, and Cas knows Bobby has his own experiences with loss. He thinks Bobby will respect his privacy.

It happens simply enough—they’re all in the kitchen. It’s movie night, again. It was Dean’s idea—since Cas is pretty much couch-bound while he recovers, at the very least putting on a movie gives him something to do. Cas has found these versions of his friends do that a lot—they even let Cas choose the movie.

Of course, what movies Cas has seen, Dean has introduced to him—so naturally Dean is stoked when he picks out The Outlaw.

Cas joins Jo at the counter, putting together sandwiches for everyone, while Ellen and Bobby are passing out beers. Sam and Dean are bickering as they make the popcorn, the way they always do, and it brings a smile to Cas’s face.

“Dude, you’re gonna burn it,” Dean says, grabbing the bag out of Sam’s hands. “You’re not doing it right, just give it here.”

Sam swats at Dean but he’s smiling so wide it looks painful. Jo and Ellen are snickering under their breath and Bobby is trying valiantly to look unamused—and failing.

“I’m not gonna burn it, just—hey!”

“Will you two knock it off,” Bobby says. “What are you, twelve?”

“Aha!” Dean exclaims in triumph, holding the bag out of Sam’s reach. “Now you can’t fuck up my popcorn!”

“You suck,” Sam groans but his face stays plastered in a grin. “You’re an awful brother.”

“That’s not true,” Cas says, lips curved into a smile. “Dean’s a wonderful brother. But he is being dramatic.”

“Ha!” Dean says as Sam exclaims, “Hey, who’s side are you on?”

“You hear that? I’m a wonderful brother.”

“Bullshit! Besides, Cas doesn’t have a brother, so he doesn’t get a vote!”

“Hey, let the man talk!”

Cas sees the opportunity for what it is—he thinks of Dean’s quivering voice, his hands gently thumbing the amulet around his neck and Cas—Cas takes a deep breath, steadies himself.

“I had a brother,” he says quietly.

Immediately, the atmosphere of the room shifts. Jo and Ellen’s laughter dies down to a hush and Cas can feel all eyes fall on him. He knows how little he’s revealed himself to these people—and he’s done so with intent. He can’t let them see too much. But this—maybe—

“I didn’t know that,” Sam says softly. “Older or younger?”

“Older,” Cas says. The smile is still tugging at his lips but it’s more subdued now. “His name was—Gabriel. He was—he was incredible.”

Tears burn hot in his eyes and his throat is thick with holding back tears. Christ, he hasn’t thought about Gabriel in—in—hell, it’s been years. Cas has spent so long fighting, he’s never had the chance to slow down and grieve for what he lost.

“Yeah?” Dean says quietly. He’s looking at Cas the same way he was before, when he told Cas about the necklace—that same soft look that Cas treasures. It reminds him so much of his Dean.

“Yeah,” Cas says. “He was annoying, too—he drove me crazy. But he was—there for me, when I needed it most. He had the uncanny ability to get himself into trouble at the worst moments, but—he also had a knack for charming his way out of that same trouble.”

Cas thinks of the last time he saw Gabriel—years before, in Apocalypse World. The sacrifice Gabriel made to save the Winchesters and Jack, to save the people Cas loved most.

“It reminds me of him,” Cas says gently. “When you two fight like that—we were the same way. He didn’t act like it, but he had a big heart. And he was a damn good hunter.”

“He sounds pretty cool,” Jo says carefully.

“He was,” Cas says, then takes in a deep breath. “And he died protecting our friends. That’s just—that’s just who he was. Even if he would never admit it.”

“Sounds a lot like you,” Bobby says pointedly, nodding his head to Sam.

“Well,” Cas says. “I suppose I am like him in many ways. He did raise me.”

“For what it’s worth,” Sam says. “I think he did a pretty damn good job of it.”

“Thank you,” Cas says quietly. “That’s—that’s nice to hear.”

When they all settle in for the movie, Cas thinks idly that maybe letting them see these little pieces of himself isn’t such a bad idea after all.

The second time Cas tells the others about himself, it’s entirely by accident. He doesn’t mean to let it slip out but apparently he’s incapable of keeping his mouth shut. Sue him, he’s had a rough couple of months.

They’re all making lunch together in the kitchen when Bobby brings up a possible hunt—a nest of vampires a few miles west of Sioux Falls.

“The thing is,” Bobby explains. “It don’t look like they’re hurtin’ anyone.”

“What do you mean?” Ellen says.

“I mean, they’re digging up graves—feeding off corpses. But as far as I can tell, they haven’t killed anyone.”

“Huh,” Sam says slowly. “Well, if they’re not hurting anyone, then…”

“Then what?” Dean says. He turns to face Sam, frowning. “They’re vampires, Sam. If they’re out there, we need to kill them.”

All at once, Cas’s heart is pounding in his chest and his hands grow clammy.

“Do you really think that?” Cas says quietly and—he keeps his voice measured but it hurts, Goddamn it. It hurts. “Vampires don’t ask to be turned. And if they’re leaving people alone—they’re not a threat. Do you really think them just existing warrants a death sentence?”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Dean says, shrugging casually. “I mean, I’ve never been given proof otherwise. A monster’s a monster.” Dean pauses. “If my Dad taught me anything, it’s that. They need to be wiped out. That’s all there is to it.”

Cas takes in a deep breath. His hands are trembling, he realizes. He clenches them into fists and busies himself with making lunch faster.

“That’s not true,” Sam says to his left and—Cas looks over. There’s something in his tone of voice that’s off. “Just because something isn’t human doesn’t automatically mean they’re evil, Dean.”

“You ever met something nonhuman that’s good?” Dean says. “Dad was right,” Dean repeats and Cas suddenly feels like this conversation is about something very different.

“Dad didn’t know everything, Dean,” Sam says quietly. Now the air feels charged between the two and Cas glances from Sam to Dean uneasily. He knows what his Dean thinks of John—he knows how John hurt him—but this? This is new to Cas. These versions of the Winchesters have only recently lost him, from what Cas can tell—that, or he’s still alive, and choosing not to be with them. Cas isn’t sure which would be worse.

“He was a good hunter,” Dean says, voice hard. “And he knew what he was talking about.”

“So what, you take his word as holy writ?” Sam says. He crosses his arms and stares Dean down unblinkingly. Cas watches Bobby share a glance with Ellen—they must know what this is about, but frankly, Cas is lost.

Cas thinks back to what he knows about John Winchester—and what he knows, he doesn’t like. He thinks of Dean’s vulnerable voice, the way he couldn’t meet Cas’s eyes as he told Cas about Daddy’s blunt little instrument. Cas hates what John Winchester put his children through, but he also knows that this younger version of Dean clearly still has loyalty to him.

“It’s not about that, Sam,” Dean says. His hands are clenched into fists around the cuffs of his leather jacket—John’s leather jacket. Cas wonders how long it took his Dean to let John go—wonders how long it will take this Dean, too.

“Except it is,” Sam insists. “That’s exactly what this is about. I mean, Jesus Christ, Dean, even dead, you still take his side!”

Ah, so he is dead. That explains a lot.

Dean reels back as if he’s been slapped across the face. Bobby steps forward now, arms raised in a placating gesture. There’s tension across the lines of his shoulders and his face.

“Alright, that’s enough,” Bobby says evenly. “This ain’t helping anything, boys.”

“Stay out of this, Bobby,” Dean snaps. Cas blinks—he doesn’t think he’s ever heard Dean speak to Bobby that way.

“Excuse me?” Bobby says, hackles raised. Cas really hopes Dean doesn’t—

“You’re not a part of this,” Dean says. “So stay out of it.”

Goddamn it, Dean, Cas thinks.

“You always do this, Dean!” Sam exclaims. He sounds angry but Cas can see he’s hurt, too. “Just admit it! Ever since Dad died, you’ve been acting like—like none of the shit he did mattered!”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about you fucking reminiscing and shit about Dad! After what he did? What he said? You’re still gonna defend him, even now? I guess what they say is true,” Sam says, and his voice is bitter. “Death really does make saints out of sinners.”

“Don’t talk about him that way,” Dean says and—Cas recognizes that look on his face, he would know it in any universe. Cas knows firsthand the damage Dean is capable of when he’s angry. He’s bore witness to it—and been at its mercy—more than once.

The difference is, here, he isn’t in any place to intervene. What he has to say holds no merit to either of them, not concerning John—because here, he isn’t supposed to even know anything about him.

Cas keeps his mouth shut. He needs to stay out of this.

“Don’t talk about him what way, Dean?”

“Like he was some kind of monster!”

“Oh,” Sam says, and he smiles now—and it’s full of vitriol. This is a deep hurt, Cas realizes, far deeper than he ever knew. “You wanna talk about monsters? You think it’s wrong of me, to talk about him that way? Well, how about how he talked about me?”

If looks could kill, Sam would be dead right now, Cas knows. Dean clenches his jaw and his eyes are alight. His soul pulses within him and—it’s that same grief from before, Cas realizes. Grief disguised as rage, flowering into contempt—this has always been the way that Dean hurts. 

“All I wanted,” Sam says, his voice measured. “Was a normal life. I just wanted him not to hate me, Dean, and he couldn’t even do that!”

“Dad didn’t hate you, that’s bullshit!”

“He certainly fucking acted like he did!”

“You chose to be here,” Dean says, and he sounds defensive now. “That was your choice, Sam, don’t act like it wasn’t!”

“I never had a choice,” Sam shoots back. “The only reason either of us are here is because we didn’t have a choice, Dean! He wouldn’t give us one!”

“Enough!”

Bobby steps physically between the two of them but—Dean steps around him, his chest puffed out, all confrontational—all performative. Cas knows Dean, knows him like his own mind. This is not real, Cas realizes. This is Dean manifesting his anguish in the only way he knows how.

And Cas—Cas can’t watch this. He can’t let this happen. Cas thinks of purgatory, of Dean’s quaking voice, I don’t know why I get so angry. He won’t let Dean self-destruct like this.

“Dean,” Cas says, and he steps forward, gently pushing Dean back. “Stop.”

Dean’s eyes shift to him, and they’re angry.

“Back off,” Dean snaps. “Get the hell out of my way.”

“Cas, I wouldn’t do that,” Bobby warns.

“You don’t get to do this,” Sam says. “You don’t get to—to unhappen all the hell he put us through, just because he’s dead. You don’t get to tell me that it wasn’t real!”

“You’re the one holding a fucking grudge, Sam! What, you can’t give him a break, even when he’s dead?”

“That’s not the point and you know it!”

“When are you gonna forgive him already?”

“I said stop,” Cas yells. He glances over his shoulder—Bobby is all tension. Ellen is watching, arms crossed, from the kitchen counter. Her eyes are locked with Bobby’s and they’re trading looks—ones Cas can’t decipher in this chaos. Jo’s face is drawn and she’s standing stock-still in the corner. Briefly, Cas wonders what this means to her—wonders about her own father—but doesn’t have the time to dwell on it. He needs to handle this first.

“Both of you, that’s enough,” Cas says evenly. “You’re acting like children.”

“Fuck you,” Dean says and Cas—is surprised at the level of malice in his voice. Something stirs in Cas, some carefully contained anger—the injustice of his own situation. Offense, on Sam’s behalf. And, deep down, the shame he feels—he knows what this Dean would think of him, if he knew who he really was.

Cas thinks of his own father, of Chuck—he tries not to think about him these days. He hasn’t prayed to him since that first night back. But Cas is all too familiar with what Sam is saying—he knows how Sam has struggled with his birthright, and this Sam has no idea the extent of just how different he is.

Cas thinks of the hallways of the bunker and Chuck’s biting words—the crack in his chassis. Cas was never going to be good enough for his father—never obedient enough. Never enough of an angel, the same way Sam was never enough of a hunter. Too different. Made wrong.

Cas knows when he opens his mouth that he shouldn’t—this isn’t his fight. And yet—and yet—

“I said that’s enough,” Cas repeats. It’s too late to back down now, he’s in too deep. So he meets Dean’s challenging gaze and looks him dead in the eye. Dean’s anger isn’t new to him. This is a dance Cas learned the steps to years ago.

“You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,” Dean spits out. “So stay the hell out of it.”

“Don’t I?” Cas says. He clenches his hands into fists at his side. “I know plenty about deadbeat fathers, Dean. Your grief is your own. Don’t take it out on Sam.”

For a moment, shocked silence—Cas can feel all eyes in the room trained on him. Dean’s face falls slack—a look of surprise. Then, it morphs quickly into hurt, then quicker into rage.

“Who the hell do you think you are?” Dean growls.

Cas has a startling moment of clarity—the kind he’s had before, a few years prior, when he left and Dean didn’t stop him—that seems to slow time down around him. The moment when everything changes—that pinpoint. Cas aches. It wasn’t supposed to be this way.

But Cas knows this is more about him and less about Sam and Dean—he’s defending himself, not Sam. Cas thinks briefly of how selfish he is; he can’t help it. And the open wound of an absent father is the kind that festers and flares with each little reminder. He doesn’t know how to make it stop hurting.

So Cas doesn’t hold back—he lets it all go, lets all his anguish out in a rush, from the open wound inside him into the confines of the kitchen. His friends are bearing witness to a side of him he hasn’t let them see—the grief of the disappointing son revealing the parts of him he’s worked so hard to keep hidden.

“I told you hunting was a family business Dean, and I wasn’t exaggerating,” Cas says, his voice strung tight. “No sane man, no kind or rational man, subjects his children to that type of horror so young. No sane man refuses to grant his children a choice. That’s the important thing here, Dean—having a choice. You can feel any way you’d like about your father—but that doesn’t change Sam’s experience. That doesn’t give him back his choice.”

Dean pushes him back and—Cas stumbles from the shock of being pushed, rather than the actual force of it. Dean couldn’t hurt him if he tried. But Cas is still nursing his wounds, still slowly getting better—it’s partly for show, and partly an honest reaction. He staggers back until his lower back hits the kitchen counter. He winces as the wounds along his torso re-open. Blinking back his shock, Cas looks back up at Dean, who sends him another scolding look before storming out. His footsteps go from the living room, to the front door—which slams shut—then fades out on the porch.

Silence. Dead silence. Cas closes his eyes, feeling a belated rush of humiliation wash over him.

That was, quite possibly, the stupidest and most embarrassing thing he could have done in front of these people. Cas keeps his eyes squeezed closed. His chest is tight, as if there’s some invisible band wrapped around it, restricting his breathing. Hot tears sting behind his closed eyelids.

Suddenly, Cas wants to be anywhere but here. He doesn’t care where, but he wants to be alone. He doesn’t want to deal with the fallout of his actions.

In that moment, Cas misses Jack. He misses him so much it hurts, misses his kind eyes and his reassuring smile. Even when Cas had no one, he had Jack.

Surrounded by his friends, Cas feels lonelier than he has in months.

“Cas,” Ellen says and—it’s so rare for her to call him by his name. Even now, she calls him stranger, usually with some sort of affection or at least respect. Cas doesn’t even want to think about what he looks like right now. “You’re bleeding,” she says and—

Cas opens his eyes, valiantly trying to ignore the tears that run down his face. He looks down and—she’s right, actually. Blood is spotting against his tee-shirt. He hadn’t realized Dean had jostled him that hard. It isn’t really painful, at least.

“You should get cleaned up,” Jo says quietly. “I’ll get the first aid kit.”

“Right,” Cas says, and his voice sounds hollow to his own ears.

“Cas,” Bobby says. He steps forward, puts his hand on Cas’s shoulder. “You alright, son?”

“I’m sorry,” Cas says distantly. “I don’t—I feel a little dizzy. I should sit down.”

Cas glances over to Sam and—Sam’s face is drained of all color but his eyes are wet. He looks away, unable to hold Cas’s gaze. Cas flushes, shame settling thick in his stomach. He hadn’t meant to make this worse for Sam. He hadn’t meant for any of this to happen.

“Come on, son,” Bobby says quietly. “Let’s get you fixed up.”

Cas lets them clean him up. Sam disappears to his room and doesn’t come out again for a long time.

“I’m sorry,” Cas says. They’ve been working in silence—Bobby’s been helping him slow the bleeding while Ellen and Jo watch him with calculated gazes.

“Sounded like you took that pretty personal,” Ellen says carefully.

“I know,” Cas says quietly. “I shouldn’t have. I—I didn’t mean for it to escalate like that.”

“What, you think you’re the only one here with daddy issues?” Jo says, quirking a brow at him. Cas hesitates, then shrugs.

“It’s not really my business,” Cas says. “I should have stayed out of it.”

“Probably,” Bobby says. “What’s done is done. Just give ‘em some time. Their dad ain’t an easy subject for them.”

“How’d you know?” Jo says suddenly. “About their dad, I mean—did they tell you or something?”

Cas pauses, thinking about how he could rationally explain it.

“It takes one to know one,” Cas says. “I just—I suppose it’s easy to recognize it in other people, when you know it so well in yourself.”

“I’m guessing yer daddy was a hunter, too,” Bobby says.

“The best of the best,” Cas says, thinking of Chuck wiping out entire universes with the snap of his fingers. “He was a cruel man. Or is—I don’t even know if he’s still alive. I don’t—I don’t think I want to know.” Cas swallows thickly, tears building in his lashline. “But I suppose it doesn’t matter. Dead or not, he—he has a habit of haunting you, even after he’s gone.”

“You said your brother raised you,” Ellen says gently.

“He did,” Cas says, then hesitates. “I don’t—I don’t talk about my family much. And I—I have my reasons for that. I don’t like to think about them.”

Cas blinks away the tears, scrubbing a hand down his face. He glances at each of them in turn—they don’t seem that angry with him. So he takes a deep breath, and takes another chance.

“He used to say I was made wrong,” Cas whispers. “My other brothers and sisters, they—they thought I was an abomination. Gabriel, he was an exception—but the rest? They despised me.”

“Why?” Jo says quietly. In the aftermath of his fight with Dean, sitting in the kitchen while his friends patch him up—it feels sacred. And it feels safe.

Cas can’t tell them the full truth, he knows—but he can tell them some. He can tell them enough.

“I fell in love with someone they—they didn’t approve of. When my father found out, he was furious.” Cas pauses, takes in a steadying breath. “I was given a choice—an ultimatum,” Cas says carefully. “They told me I had to choose—them, or the man I was in love with. My family, they made it clear—whatever I chose, it would be final.”

Cas squeezes his eyes shut, thinks of Dean’s beautiful soul.

“I chose him,” he says. “I loved him too much, I couldn’t leave him. So I chose him—and my family forsook me. But my father? He never let it go. And he’s held it against me, ever since.”

“Why aren’t you with him now?” Ellen says, but when Cas opens his eyes to look at her, it looks like she already knows.

“He’s gone,” Cas says. “He’s gone and it—it almost killed me. It should’ve.”

Cas looks away now.

“But it doesn’t matter. I don’t want to go back. They wouldn’t take me, even if I did. Just because he’s gone doesn’t mean—I don’t still love him. And I can’t be around people who think my loving him is a sin. I just can’t.”

The looks they send him now are pity—Cas knows it’s a simplified version of events. He can’t tell them about the angels’ contempt for humans, God’s contempt for Cas choosing humanity—but this is something they can understand. And if this is the closest approximation of the truth he can give, then he’ll take it.

He doesn’t know how he’s going to make it up to Dean and Sam—but at the very least, sitting here, surrounded by his friends, he knows he’s let something poisonous out of him that had been festering for a very long time.

Maybe now that it’s out, he can finally begin to heal.

Later that night, when everyone’s retired to their rooms to sleep with firm instructions to Cas to rest, Cas sneaks out of bed and heads outside.

He isn’t used to this Dean being upset with him and it—really bothers him, actually. He couldn’t sleep even if he wanted to.

With a sigh, Cas wanders out into the junkyard. He’s mindful of his injuries—he’s healing slowly but surely, but he’s overall fairly sore. It doesn’t pain him in the way it would if he were human—and a good thing, too. He knows he has a few more weeks of healing before he’s back to normal.

“What are you doing out here?”

Cas startles, turning to see Dean perched atop one of the hollowed-out cars. His face is carefully neutral but his eyes are red, like he’s been crying.

“Dean,” Cas says softly. “I didn’t realize you were out here.” Cas hesitates, then steps closer. “Do you mind if I join you?” Cas says quietly. A calculated risk, Cas knows—for a moment, Dean just looks at him silently, before finally he nods.

“Sure, whatever.”

Cas climbs up on the hood slowly and settles next to Dean, careful to leave plenty of space between them. He hasn’t forgotten his Dean’s lectures on personal space.

He misses being close to Dean, though.

Cas isn’t sure how he’s supposed to start this apology—he’s not as surefooted as he would be with his Dean. But this Dean—he cares about this Dean, too. And he doesn’t want him to be hurting because of comments that Cas made.

“I’m sorry,” Cas says, not knowing how else to begin. “Dean, I’m truly sorry. I know it’s no excuse but for what it’s worth, everything I said—it wasn’t about you. That was my own—bullshit, honestly. I suppose I—get defensive. You were right—I don’t know anything about the situation with your father. And it’s not my business. I shouldn’t have taken my own issues out on you, and for that, I’m sorry.”

Cas fiddles with his hands, finding it difficult to look at Dean in that moment.

“That was between you and your brother, and I shouldn’t have gotten involved. I hope you can forgive me.”

“What was your dad like?” Dean says and—it’s surprising enough that Cas looks up and over at Dean, meeting his gaze uneasily. He hadn’t expected that, honestly.

“Vindictive,” Cas says quietly. “Selfish. Unloving. My father—he viewed obedience as devotion. Love was—secondary to him. More than anything, he wanted an obedient soldier.”

“Were you?” Dean says. “Obedient?”

“No,” Cas says, letting out a deep sigh. “At first, I was but—I changed. I questioned his beliefs, his orders—until I couldn’t take it anymore. And he never forgave me for it. And I suppose I never forgave him, either.”

“You didn’t want to be a hunter,” Dean says—and it comes out more as a statement than a question. Cas hesitates.

“It was more complicated than that,” Cas says. “But it doesn’t matter anymore. He’s not in my life, and that’s for the better. I just—I just don’t want to end up like him.”

After that, Dean’s quiet for a long time. He looks away from Cas, tilts his head back and fixes his eyes on the stars. After a few minutes, Cas does the same thing.

“He died,” Dean murmurs after an indeterminable silence. “My dad, I mean. A couple months ago. And it was my fault.”

Cas stays quiet—lets Dean tell the story at his own pace.

“I couldn’t—I couldn’t stop it,” Dean says slowly. “And now I have to live with it. And that’s the point, right? I have to live with it and he’s—he’s not resting in peace, or whatever bullshit people say when someone dies. He’s suffering in Hell because of me. And I can’t do anything about it. It was supposed to be me. Not him.”

“You can’t save everyone, Dean,” Cas says softly.

“It ain’t about that,” Dean insists. “He’s my father. I should’ve protected him. I mean, what kind of hunter am I, if I can’t even protect my own family?”

“But you do,” Cas says. Dean finally looks at him again then—his face drawn and his shoulders tense. It’s more vulnerable than Cas has seen Dean in a long time. “You protect your brother. You look after him every day, in all you do—I see it, not just in hunts. You show kindness and support to the people you love—you do it with Bobby and Ellen and Jo. Family is about more than just protection, Dean. It’s about love, too, and you have plenty to spare. That’s not nothing.”

“That don’t change what happened,” Dean says thickly. “Love doesn’t bring people back from the dead.”

“It doesn’t,” Cas says gently. “Love does more than that—it gives life meaning. Everybody must die one day, Dean. Maybe you couldn’t save your father—but I can see you loved him. That gives meaning to the life he lived, and your own.”

Dean shakes his head.

“I don’t get you,” Dean says. “How can you even think like that? I know you lost someone—you told me. That night, after the demons. You told me you had someone and you lost them.”

“I did,” Cas says simply. “And it’s the most painful thing I’ve ever gone through. And the loneliest. But I’ll always be grateful—for how it changed me. And what it gave me. Love lingers far beyond the grave, Dean. That’s the important part. The only thing that outlives death is—love. And my grief? How I hurt? That’s love, too. I wouldn’t wish it away because it lets me keep loving him, even though he’s gone.”

At that, Dean looks away again. His hands are clenched into fists where they rest on his knees. And Cas—Cas needs to be careful, he knows. He can test the boundaries here—gently.

Slowly, hesitantly, Cas reaches out a hand and settles it on Dean’s shoulder.

“I can see how much your family means to you, Dean,” Cas says quietly. “And I can see how much you mean to them. That your father would love you enough to trade his life for yours—that says a great deal more about you than you not being able to save him. Remember that.”

Dean peeks at him from the corner of his eye. His shoulder is tense beneath Cas’s hand but he doesn’t pull away.

“You know,” Cas says carefully. “Your father didn’t need to be perfect for you to love him. And being angry with him, or upset—it doesn’t lessen that love, or invalidate it. It doesn’t make it mean less. It can be difficult, to be angry with someone after they die, because it feels like a betrayal. It’s not, Dean, it’s just—human nature. You’re allowed to miss him in whatever way you miss him.”

“Sam’s wrong,” Dean whispers. “He acts like our dad hated him or something—he didn’t. He adored Sam.” Dean chuckles but it’s bitter. “That’s why he was so pissed at him, when Sam wanted out—because Sam’s the one with potential. The smart one. The golden child.” Dean pauses, his eyes fixed on some point in the distance. “I never had that. My dad saw me for exactly what I was—and nothing more. A good soldier. I was never gonna go places like Sam was—and he knew it.”

And that’s—a lot, actually. It’s about what he already knew of John Winchester—and of the way Dean thinks of himself. It hurts, for him to be so young and still think so lowly of himself.

“I wish you wouldn’t speak of yourself that way, Dean,” Cas says. “A person’s worth is measured by more than their potential. And for the record—I think you’re doing just fine.”

“You don’t even know me, man,” Dean scoffs.

I do know you, Cas thinks helplessly. I know you so well, Dean. I wish you knew me like I know you.

“I know enough,” Cas says instead. “I’ve been told I’m an extremely good judge of character. You can’t change my mind.”

“Sounds like you’re pretty stubborn.”

“Unfortunately,” Cas says and Dean laughs—quiet but there. Cas smiles, small, victorious. “I’ve always been that way. It’s kept me alive, though. Gets me into trouble, too, I suppose.”

“I’m sorry,” Dean says, meeting his eyes. “I didn’t mean to—snap at you like that, or whatever.”

“Dean,” Cas says gently. “It’s alright. I overreacted. Are we—are we good?”

“We’re good,” Dean says. “Let’s just—never talk about this again, yeah?”

“Fair enough,” Cas says. “I can do that.” He pauses. “We should probably get some rest.”

“Yeah, I know,” Dean sighs. “I gotta talk to Sam first.”

Cas winces. That reminds him, actually.

“I need to apologize to him, as well,” Cas says. “I suppose I’ll talk to him in the morning.”

“Don’t sweat it, man,” Dean says. “Kid’s too nice for his own good. He’s not gonna—hold a grudge or anything.”

“I know,” Cas says quietly.

They head back inside together and—

It’s a step. A small one, maybe, but Cas supposes it was never going to be smooth sailing. It never really has been, with Dean—but it’s still been good. It’s still Dean.

Maybe Cas doesn’t know what the future will hold for him now—but at least he has Dean. He’s going to make sure he doesn’t fuck that up, if it’s the only thing he does.

Chapter Text

Everything changes by late October. After, in the dead of night, when Cas is sitting with his head in his hands, trying to trace back the line of events—each stepping stone, each wrong turn, each domino—he won’t be able to say for sure what led him here. All he knows is that somewhere along the way, he made a grave mistake. And this time, he’s not the only one paying the price.

A month into staying with his new friends, Cas is confident in saying he’s grown comfortable around them. It takes a few weeks for Cas’s injuries to heal and in that time, he mostly lays low. He can’t do much anyway, not without raising suspicion. During the interim, it’s all too easy to fall in deeper with these people. It’s all too easy to let them just a little bit closer.

Even still, there are some truths Cas will take to the grave.

A week before Halloween, Ellen presents them with a new case. The Winchesters have taken on a handful of random cases while Cas has been on bedrest, but Ellen invites everyone—including Cas—to this one. It would be his first hunt back and Cas is—nervous. While it’s nice to not be stuck in a bed anymore, he’s hesitant to risk losing the tentative peace that’s settled over them.

The case is fairly cut and dry, as far as hauntings go. Ellen’s already done the research—the ghost is tied to an old grandfather clock kept in an office building the ghost’s great-great-great-great grandson works at. Problem is, being a trust-fund baby, it’s a nice gig—complete with security they have no way past.

“The layout of the building is pretty straightforward,” Ellen explains, leaning against the counter with a beer. She’s been casing the building, trying to figure out their way in.“But it’s monitored 24/7, and there’s a security guard posted at the front desk. I’ve been watching, and he doesn’t let anyone in that doesn’t have an ID badge.”

“Just knock him out,” Dean suggests.

“Dean,” Sam huffs. “The guard doesn’t have anything to do with this. How’s that fair to him?”

“So we distract the guard,” Cas cuts in. “Slip past him, find the clock ourselves, and destroy it.”

“Not likely,” Dean scoffs. “Place that fancy? There’s gotta be cameras, too. We get caught on camera breaking and entering, we’re fucked. I don’t know about you guys, but I’d rather not be charged with any more felonies.”

“Any more?” Cas says, frowning.

“How old is the guard?” Jo says suddenly, her face contemplative.

“My age,” Ellen says, shrugging. “Maybe a little younger. Why?”

A sly grin blooms on Jo’s face and she says, “Hey, mom—how do you feel about a honey-trap?”

Ellen looks decidedly unamused.

“Excuse me?”

“Just seduce him,” Jo says. “Distract him while we go upstairs and get the clock. All you have to do is keep him distracted for a few minutes while we destroy it.”

“What about the cameras?” Sam points out.

“Actually,” Cas says. “I may be able to assist with that.”

“You good with technology?” Dean says, raising an eyebrow at him.

“Trust me,” Cas says. “It won’t be an issue. Ellen distracts the guard, you guys find the clock, and I wipe the cameras in the control room. It’ll be like we were never there.”

Cas doesn’t actually know anything about technology, but it’ll be easy enough to use his powers to destroy the tapes. They’ll just assume it’s some kind of glitch, but he’ll make sure they can’t recover the footage.

“Sounds like a plan to me,” Dean says, grinning.

“You ready to get back in the game, stranger?” Ellen asks.

“I am,” Cas says. “Frankly, the past few weeks have been—a lot. I’ve been going stir crazy. I’m ready to get back on my feet now.”

“Well,” Bobby says. “This is the case to do it. Nothing too strenuous. You reopen your wounds, yer gonna end up right back on that bed. Then you’re back to square one.”

“Don’t worry,” Cas says. “I’m not concerned about that. It’s a simple case. What could go wrong?”

As it will turn out later: everything.

The foremost issue with their plan, Cas will realize after, is that it operates entirely on one huge assumption they have no evidence to back up—and it was so subtle, he didn’t even notice it at first. As it is, it ends up derailing the entire hunt.

The journey to the office building is unremarkable. Each of them has an assigned task: Ellen distracts the guard at the front desk; Cas goes into the control room to wipe the cameras; Bobby takes out the fire alarms; and Jo, Sam, and Dean burn the clock and put out the fire without it spreading. Simple. Nothing they haven’t done before.

The biggest problem presents itself before they even step foot inside that goddamn building.

Through the glass of the front doors, they can see into the building, where a man is posted at the front desk. 

“There’s the guard,” Jo murmurs. They’ve all gathered their needed supplies: now they just need to get inside. “Mom, you’re up.”

“Alright,” Ellen says. “Give me a few minutes. Let me get him away from that desk.”

Later, Cas won’t be able to say for sure why he does it; perhaps it’s nothing more than an instinct, a gut feeling that something is off. He will never be able to articulate why he makes the choice he makes, but regardless he does it.

Something about the guard—bothers him. He looks like an ordinary man, maybe in his late 40’s or early 50’s. There’s nothing particularly remarkable about him, where he’s sitting at his desk, filling out a crossword but—Cas has an inkling. So very quickly, very subtly, while the others’ backs are turned, Cas minutely draws on his grace and looks into the guard’s mind.

A flash of memories: his name is Dave. 49 years old. Family in Kentucky. Then, there, hidden behind an onslaught of unremarkable mundanity: a young boy with beautiful eyes. Their hands grazing under the tablecloth. A secret smile.

Cas’s stomach drops out from under him and he quickly withdrawals from the man’s—Dave’s—mind.

Shit. He’s gay.

Cas only has moments before Ellen is going to try—and fail—to seduce this guy. And Cas—this is his first hunt getting back in the game. And he wants to get rid of this goddamn ghost. He can’t risk Ellen going in there and jeopardizing their entry.

Cas’s mouth opens before he can even consider the consequences.

“Wait,” Cas blurts. Ellen turns to him, eyebrow raised.

“Something wrong?” She says.

“I hadn’t realized,” Cas says. “But this isn’t going to work. I wish I’d known before.”

Ellen’s frowning now, trading confused glances with Bobby.

“Known what?”

“The guard,” Cas says, nodding towards Dave. “You can’t seduce him. It won’t work.”

“What are you talking about?” Jo butts in. “Cas, we all agreed on this plan. We’re already here, we can’t just change it now.”

“Jo’s right,” Ellen says. “Why don’t you think it’ll work?”

Cas huffs, frustrated with himself. He wishes they knew him well enough to just trust him. He wishes he knew them well enough to just tell them the fucking truth.

“His name is Dave,” Cas says awkwardly. “And you can’t seduce him because—because you’re not his type, okay?”

“Cas—what the hell are you talking about?” Dean says.

Frustration bubbles in Cas—he knows it’s not their fault. They hadn’t considered this. But their entire plan hinges on Ellen distracting the guard and now—

“I’ll do it,” Cas says.

“Do what?” Ellen says.

“Distract the guard.”

“What—dude, Ellen’s gonna like—seduce him and shit. That’s the whole point,” Dean says. But Ellen’s gaze has sharpened and she looks interested now. She glances over at Bobby again and shrugs a shoulder.

“And what makes you think he’ll be more receptive to you?” Ellen says.

“Guys, I don’t think we should be making assumptions about people like that,” Sam cuts in.

“I’m not making assumptions,” Cas says sourly. “I told you already, his name is Dave. And he’s not interested in women.”

“Okay, sure,” Sam says. “And you know this how?”

It occurs to Cas that—this is news to Sam and Dean. Bobby, Ellen, Jo—he’s given them enough information for them to come to their own conclusions. They already know he fell in love with a man in the past—it’s reasonable enough to come to the conclusion that he isn’t heterosexual. But Sam and Dean—they weren’t present for that conversation.

It’s not lost on Cas, the irony of the situation, the tragedy of the situation—he never got to do this, with his Sam and Dean. The closest he got was when he confessed to his Dean how he felt, and that went beyond a mere discussion of sexuality—that was less a coming out, and more of a coming in: coming in from the rain, coming in to himself. It freed something in him that had been held back before—or perhaps been held captive. While the end result is similar, the sentiment is not the same.

And now—Cas is here, in the past, in Sioux Falls, and whatever chance he had before to share that part of himself with the Winchesters is long gone, and in its place right now: Cas outing himself out of necessity for this hunt.

Something bitter unfurls in Cas’s chest. His temper ticks up and, suddenly, Cas doesn’t want to be here anymore. He doesn’t want to work this case, he doesn’t want to be with his friends, and he certainly doesn’t want to be having this conversation. He wants to be alone.

Like he always does in these types of moments, Cas misses Jack fiercely. He didn’t have to talk to Jack for Jack to know him; he just did. It was intrinsic, instinctual; every part of Jack was part of Cas as well. Cas may have never sat down and had a conversation with Jack about it, but Jack knew. Of course Jack knew, because he knew Cas better than any other creature physically could.

And now everyone’s eyes are trained on him—this is it.

This is not how Cas imagined this going.

“Cas,” Dean hedges. “What the hell makes you think the dude’s gay?”

“Because, Dean,” Cas snaps, chest aching. “The last time I saw him, we were fucking in some back-ally bar in Kentucky.”

If it were any other conversation, the looks on Sam and Dean’s faces would be comical. As it is, Cas’s temper flares even more.

“So I can go in there, re-introduce myself, and keep him occupied for a good ten minutes. That gives you time to find the clock and destroy it. Unless, of course, you think it’s too shameful for me to whore myself out to some stranger whose dick I sucked once ten years ago,” Cas adds, just out of spite.

Dead silence. Cas glances to the side—Jo has a subtle smirk on her face and if Cas didn’t know any better, he’d think she was almost impressed. Ellen’s arms are crossed but her expression is amused. Bobby, for his part, has his eyebrows raised nearly up to his hairline.

Sam’s eyes are wide and his cheeks are flushed—if Cas knows anything about Sam, he’s mentally berating himself for making those assumptions about Cas. It would be funny if it wasn’t so depressing.

Dean though—Dean’s face is carefully neutral. Almost too neutral. Some deeply buried part of him—the part that quietly mourns the absence of his Dean—flares in pain. Is he—disgusted? Uncomfortable? Dean’s measured lack of reaction is more terrifying than any hurtful comment he could make.

“Well,” Bobby says, unaware of Cas’s inner turmoil. “All in favor of Cas—eh, I’m not gonna say it.”

“Whoring himself out?” Jo finishes, lip twitching at the edges. She’s holding back laughter, Cas realizes.

“Aye,” Ellen says with a sigh, raising her right hand. Bobby’s hand goes up next, then Jo’s—then, shamefaced and his expression meek, Sam’s hand goes up as well. Everyone turns to Dean.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Dean says, and Cas can’t quite pick apart his tone of voice. “Alright, fine.”

His hand goes up.

And thus Cas’s fate is sealed.

The problem with Cas making his friends think that Dave is an old hook up, is now he actually has to seduce him. And Cas has never done something like that before.

He also knows Dave is still closeted. So he has no idea the right way to go about this.

Cas thinks back to how he was before he realized he was in love with Dean—how he felt, but he didn’t understand it. Because Dean was his first friend, Cas only assumed it was natural—to crave his nearness, to cherish his touch, to marvel at the soft pulse of his soul, to look into his eyes and not be able to look away. Dean was captivating and Cas was so, so happy to be enthralled by him, Cas was so glad to have Dean’s company. Wanting Dean is both the easiest and the hardest thing in Cas’s existence; it’s brought him the most joy and the most heartache.

And yet, nothing quite compared to those early years. Back before Cas understood what he was feeling, before the world began to tell him he should be ashamed of it. The angels always thought his affection for Dean was shameful, but it changed after Cas knew he was in love with him. Same story, different verse and all that.

But still—it was the little things. In those days, even the touch of Dean’s hand to his shoulder was enough to make him tremble down to his very bones. Starved for Dean’s affection. Not knowing what to do with it, when he had it.

Maybe Cas doesn’t know anything about seducing a stranger, but he knows plenty about longing, and he knows his own strengths.

Surprisingly, it’s easy enough to get Dave distracted.

Cas plays the fool; he’s so sorry to barge in here so late, but his car broke down and he thinks he’s lost, and is there any way Dave could help him?

It works, slowly but surely. Dave really is a nice man, and Cas feels badly for deceiving him, but this keeps him out of harm’s way, too. And if something vicious within Cas preens at the way Dave looks at him—if something hollow in him comes to life at being looked at like he’s worth looking at—well, that’s not Cas’s fault. He’s been so lonely for so long now. Even the attention of a stranger is enough to make him feel good.

And sure, maybe he doesn’t actually need to seduce Dave for this plan to work—he just has to get him away from the front desk. But with what Cas has risked, saying what he said out by the car, it starts to seem more and more like a consolation prize rather than an impulsive decision.

Maybe Cas just isn’t used to feeling wanted like this.

In the end, Cas isn’t even sure if it will work, but he decides to try—looking at Dave from under his eyelashes like he’s seen women do; acting demure by rubbing at the back of his neck, fretting with the hem of his shirt; looking at Dave’s mouth as if he’s distracted by it and can’t help himself.

When Dave nonchalantly offers to take a look at Cas’s car for him and see if he can fix it, Cas knows he’s won.

Of course, nothing is actually wrong with the Impala. By the time he leads Dave to it, the others have long since hidden themselves. He opens the hood for Dave and lets him inspect the engine—out of the corner of his eye, he can see the others sneaking into the building.

Given that Baby is actually fine, Dave concludes that he’ll probably need to call a tow truck and get it inspected at an auto shop.

“I know it’s late,” he says. “It’s getting cold out here. Why don’t you come on in and wait inside?”

And—is that a come-on? Cas thinks it is.

Without thinking too hard about it, Cas accepts the offer.

What the hell, right?

As it turns out, Cas is not as brave as he thought.

Cas estimates it’s been at least ten minutes. He knows the others have to be finishing up by the time he and Dave wind up back at the front desk. He knows once the others are finished, they’ll sneak out the back door on the first floor.

When Dave runs a hand down Cas’s arm all faux-casual, Cas freezes. In turn, so does Dave.

And now Dave is examining him quietly, a note of panic evident in the tension of his shoulders. Cas doesn’t mean to frighten him, but suddenly this doesn’t seem like such a good idea.

What is he trying to prove, anyway?

It’s as Cas is having this internal battle with himself, with Dave watching closely for his reaction, that it happens: all at once, cold water is raining down on them both. It takes a moment for Cas to realize the sprinklers have been set off. Caught off guard, Cas tilts his head up to the ceiling and stares in shock. Apparently, disabling the fire alarm doesn’t disable the sprinklers. How about that.

“Oh, shit,” Dave breathes. He strides to the nearby fire alarm and pulls it—and there goes the alarm. Cas’s hands cover his ears and he cringes. This was not in the plan.

“I’m sorry,” Dave says and he looks it. “I need to call my supervisor.”

“It’s okay,” Cas says. “I’ll call a cab. Thank you for your help.” Cas hesitates. “Good luck, Dave.”

Cas strides quickly out of the building while Dave is busy on the phone. He glances behind him when he gets to the car, to make sure Dave isn’t watching, before getting in. He doesn’t have the keys—he has to wait for the others.

Luckily, they’re not far behind. They’re soaked like Cas, but they’re there and they’re in one piece. That’s the best Cas can hope for in this case.

“Let’s get the hell out of here,” Ellen says, her hair sticking to her face in wet clumps.

“Agreed,” Bobby chimes in. They all climb back into the Impala, and Dean starts driving them away from the godforsaken building.

“You couldn’t cut the sprinklers?” Cas grouses. This night has been awful.

“Well, excuse me,” Bobby snarks. “I’m not a goddamn electrician, Cas. Not my fault their system is so damn fancy.”

Cas groans, letting his head fall back against the seat.

“So,” Jo says, and Cas can hear the smile in her voice. “How was Dave?”

“Exactly as I remember him,” Cas deadpans.

“Did he really only last ten minutes?”

“Joanna Beth!” Ellen exclaims. Despite everything, Cas has to fight the smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

“Not even that,” Cas intones and Jo dissolves into laughter.

For a moment, Jo’s laughter is echoing in the silent car—but then, Sam snickers before erupting into his own laughing fit. Then Ellen, then Bobby. Soon, the car is filled with the sound of all of their laughter—all but one.

Dean stays silent the entire ride back.

Cas knows he has a tendency to overthink things. In fact, if he remembers right, that’s one of the very first things he told the others about himself—that first night on the couch when Ellen checked on him. Cas also knows that contemplating a past he cannot change nor a future he will never have only serves to make him needlessly miserable. That being said, Cas can’t bring himself not to.

As Cas gets into his pajamas in the room he’s commandeered—well, Sam gave it to him technically, as a thanks for saving his life, but still—Cas wonders what his Dean is doing right now. He has no way to know how long he was in the Empty; while it’s been about four months for him, for all he knows, decades have passed. His Dean could be long dead.

Maybe he’s moved on and made a family. Maybe he’s settled down with a beautiful woman and had a couple kids. Maybe he doesn’t even think about Cas anymore and he’s nothing more than someone he used to know.

Maybe he’s still hunting with Sam. Maybe Jack’s looking after both of them.

Maybe he hates Cas for what he did.

Or maybe Chuck destroyed that universe and everyone he loves is long gone.

It’s useless, Cas knows, to ruminate on it—but tonight, he can’t stop it. Dean hadn’t met his eyes once since Cas came out to him before the hunt. And if this Dean is grossed out by the very idea of Cas being attracted to men, just how disgusted must his Dean have been when Cas confessed his love for him?

The thought of it—of Dean being repulsed by his love, of Cas’s one true moment of happiness being something shameful to Dean—makes something clench in Cas’s chest. He can’t help how he loves Dean. And he doesn’t even want to.

Cas is startled out of his thoughts by a gentle knock at his bedroom door. For a moment, Cas contemplates pretending to be asleep—he really doesn’t want to talk to anyone right now—but he knows the soft glow from his bedside lamp likely gives him away. And he can’t avoid his friends forever. He has to get over it.

With a resigned sigh, Cas calls out, “Come in.”

When Dean opens the door and steps into his room, Cas really doesn’t expect it. He takes a moment to reign in his surprise. He doesn’t want to be rude. That being said, if Dean is here to shame him, he’s not going to tolerate that. His fondness for Dean doesn’t extend that far, and it certainly doesn’t outweigh his own self-respect.

“You got a minute?” Dean asks. His voice is quiet and his face is carefully neutral, like it was in the car. The lack of expression—the way he studies Cas as if he’s evaluating him, trying to figure him out—grates on Cas’s nerves. And it hurts.

“Look, Dean,” Cas starts. “I’m really not in the mood, okay? So if you’re here to judge me, please just—get the hell out.”

Dean does not get out. He sends Cas one more searching look before quietly closing the door behind him. He leans against it, faux-casual, but there’s tension in the lines of his shoulders and he’s having trouble meeting Cas’s gaze.

“Did you really fuck that guy?” Dean asks quietly. Cas sighs again, pinching the bridge of his nose. Okay, so they’re having this conversation. Best to just get it over with.

Cas’s temper flares like it did before—he doesn’t have the patience for this. And he’s not going to hold Dean’s hand through it. Cas has never considered himself to be particularly spiteful but something about this specific situation is bringing it out in him.

“What’s it to you, Dean?” Cas challenges. He crosses his arms, rounding the side of the bed and standing directly in front of Dean. He won’t shy away from this—not this.

“Just answer the question,” Dean says anyway. Cas scoffs, rolling his eyes. He doesn’t understand why Dean needs to be difficult about this.

“Not that it’s any of your business,” Cas says through gritted teeth. “But no, I didn’t.”

“You said you did, in the car,” Dean insists. Cas clenches his hands into fists, breathes in deep through his nose. He can’t read the carefully contained look on Dean’s face and frankly, he’s not sure he wants to.

“I said I got him off, I didn’t say I fucked him,” Cas snaps. “For God’s sake, Dean. What, is jacking someone off a crime now? It was a hand job, not a marriage proposal.”

The fact that it’s a lie is immaterial. This isn’t about that, anyway, the details of what happened—it’s about who Cas is, and how Dean clearly has a problem with it.

“You never told me you were gay,” Dean says. Cas narrows his eyes, sending Dean a scathing look.

“You ever wonder why that is, Dean?” Cas says, stepping closer to him. He’s not—trying to intimidate Dean, per se. But Dean’s the one trying to pick a fight, and Cas isn’t afraid of that. “Did you ever stop to think maybe I kept it to myself so I could avoid this exact scenario? I don’t have to justify my decisions to you. If you have a problem with my liking men, then you can go fuck yourself, Dean.”

And it feels—God, it feels good to say it. Cas’s heart is thumping away in his chest and it hurts, arguing with Dean like this, but it feels right to stand up for himself in this way; to remind himself that, no, there’s nothing wrong with who he loves, regardless of what everyone else thinks. And while Cas will always value Dean’s opinion of him, while it will always in some way shape his own, this is something Dean cannot and will not change. It doesn’t matter how much Dean resents it: Cas will be gay regardless. He will love Dean regardless.

He doesn’t stand up for himself like this often. It’s fucking invigorating. Briefly, Cas wonders why he hasn’t done it sooner.

Cas turns, ready to kick Dean out and go the fuck to sleep—he’s had a long night.

“Or,” Dean says from behind him. “You could just fuck me yourself.”

Cas freezes.

Breath caught in his throat, eyes stinging, Cas’s chest feels tight and the room feels too small. The ache of his sore muscles, his wings on his back, tucked into the ethereal plane. His grace crying out for Dean the way it has been since he found his way into this timeline.

He can’t move, at first. It takes a moment of flexing his toes and shaking his head to get his bearings. Cas turns, raising his eyes to Dean’s with trepidation. There’s—nervousness there. And something almost like hope but—

He doesn’t trust it.

“That’s not funny,” Cas whispers after what feels like an eternity. All at once, it feels like he and Dean are standing on the edge of something—good or bad, he doesn’t know—and he’s afraid of what will happen if they fall over it.

Dean pushes himself off of the door and takes a step closer to Cas. He keeps his gaze locked with Cas’s now and his movements are slow, hesitant. Dean reaches out and his hand grasps the cotton of Cas’s tee shirt. Another step forward and Cas can make out all the individual freckles on Dean’s face. The different hues of green in his eyes.

“What makes you think I’m joking?” Dean murmurs. His voice is pitched low but in the quiet of the room, it’s deafening. Dean looks from his eyes then down to his lips. Cas sucks in a sharp breath, overwhelmed. He has no idea what’s happening but Dean—

Dean takes another step forward. They’re so close, their chests brush together. Dean is shorter than him, Cas notes distantly—he’s not used to that. Gazing down at Dean, tracking the way his eyes are latched onto Cas’s mouth. Cas clenches his hands into fists at his side to stop himself from reaching out. He squeezes his eyes shut as Dean leans forward. Their noses slot together and Cas can feel the contours of Dean’s face against his own. He’s close, he’s so close, and Cas can’t breathe.

“‘S okay,” Dean says softly. “You can touch me. ‘M not gonna freak out.”

“What are you doing?” Cas asks, his voice trembling.

“You’re hot when you’re angry,” Dean says, breathing out a chuckle. “Shit, it turns me on and you’re not even trying.”

And this is—

This is simultaneously everything Cas has ever wanted and everything he’s not supposed to have. In his struggle to rationalize what’s happening, Cas can acknowledge that maybe this Dean and his Dean are more different than he thought. He knows many things can change throughout timelines and universes—maybe even including sexuality. But—

But even if this Dean is interested in this, his Dean never was. That, Cas knows for certain. And if his Dean could see Cas now—could see him fucking taking advantage of this Dean’s youth and loneliness—he would never forgive Cas.

Cas will never see his Dean again. But his loyalty to him will never waver. And Cas can’t let this Dean do this when he has no idea who Cas really is.

“Dean,” Cas chokes out. “You don’t—you don’t even know me.”

“Don’t need to,” Dean says. “It don’t gotta mean anything. We can have a little fun. There’s nothing wrong with it.”

Cas brings his hands up to Dean’s chest with every intention of pushing him away but—Dean’s other hand covers one of his own, stroking against the back of his fingers. Cas hesitates.

“C’mon, Cas,” he mutters. “Don’t act like you don’t wanna. I see the way you look at me.”

Cas’s breath hitches and dread seeps cold into his stomach.

“You—you do?” Cas breathes.

“You’re not exactly subtle,” Dean says, but he doesn’t sound mad. “I didn’t know for sure, though, ‘til tonight.”

Jesus Christ.

“You’re so young,” Cas says, and he knows he’s grasping at straws at this point, but he’s trying to talk himself out of this as much as he’s trying to talk Dean out of it.

“So what?” Dean counters. “I’m not a kid. I know what I want. You know what you want. Besides,” Dean adds, his voice dropping down an octave. “I like older guys. And you’re really sexy. Especially when you hunt.”

Cas lets his head drop to Dean’s shoulder, taking a moment to try to collect himself. His grace is pulsing within the confines of his skin. He wants, of course he wants—he always wants Dean. But with him pressed up against Cas like this, all warm skin and hard lines, Cas can feel himself growing hard in his sweatpants. He thinks he should put some distance between them before Dean notices, before this spirals even more out of control.

But Cas can’t bring himself to step away from him.

With the way they’re tucked close together, Dean only has to tilt his head and then his lips are brushing against the skin of Cas’s neck. Cas’s entire body is rigged with tension. He’s letting out heavy breaths and his hands are trembling as Dean laves his tongue along the tendon of Cas’s throat.

Cas hands clamp down around Dean’s waist, unable to help himself, going out of his goddamn mind. He doesn’t think about it when he pulls Dean against him roughly and—Jesus Christ, he can feel Dean’s erection pressing against his thigh.

What happens next is borne of pure instinct and has nothing to do with rational thought. Cas is way past that. He walks Dean back and presses him against the door. Holds him in place and grinds his cock against the crease of Dean’s hipbone. He chokes on his own moan and he can feel where Dean’s fingernails are digging into his back, pushing up beneath his shirt and trailing down his bare skin.

“That’s it,” Dean breathes. “Fuck, that’s hot.”

Cas’s boxers are growing damp and he knows he must be leaking precome like crazy. He looks down and sees the wet spot growing on the front of his sweatpants. Turns his head and captures Dean’s lips in a kiss because he’s not strong enough to put a stop to this. He needs it too much.

Cas kisses Dean with a barely contained passion that’s been growing for over a decade. It all comes pouring out now, in the confines of this bedroom, their bodies rocking together, hands grasping at warm skin, and mouths slick with their shared spit.

Cas holds Dean’s jaw open with one hand and licks broadly into his mouth, pulling a gorgeous groan out of Dean—he wants to hear it again. He wants to see what other sounds he can draw out of Dean.

It’s all too easy, all too natural, to build up a rhythm with his thrusts, fucking his cock against the curve of Dean’s body, while Dean hikes up a leg and humps against Cas’s thigh. The door creaks intermittently with their shared weight and Cas doesn’t fucking care if they wake the whole house up. The sound of their moans overlapping is music to Cas’s ears. He’s never heard anything so beautiful or so erotic before.

“Oh, god,” Dean pants against his open mouth as he wraps his arms around the back of Cas’s neck. “Shit—I want you to fuck me, Cas.”

Cas latches his lips on the side of Dean’s throat, muffling the growl he lets out. He feels unhinged, out of control in a way he’s never been before. And to have Dean begging for him like this?

Cas worries the paper-thin skin there between his teeth, preening as Dean chokes out a groan. One of his hands wraps itself into Cas’s hair and he tugs hard, pushing Cas’s face against his throat.

“Are you sure?” Cas husks because—if Dean is allowing him this, then fuck, he’ll take it—but he has to know for sure this is what Dean wants.

“Please,” Dean whines, and he sounds so fucked-out already. “Please, I want it.”

Cas doesn’t hesitate: he wraps his arms tight around Dean’s waist then hoists him up, gripping Dean’s ass in his hands and encouraging him to wrap his legs around him. Dean complies, clinging to him, breaths fanning hot against Cas’s face. Cas walks them to his bed and lays Dean onto it, only pulling away so he can strip Dean of his clothes.

Revealing each new piece of skin, unveiling Dean like this—Cas throbs in his pants, mindlessly palms against his own cock to try to ease the ache. Dean looks up at him, eyes half-lidded and pupils blown out. He’s the very picture of debauchery and Cas can’t stand it.

“You too,” Dean rasps. He pushes himself up onto his elbows and tugs at the hem of Cas’s shirt. “C’mon, lemme see you, I wanna see.”

“Patience,” Cas says, leaning forward to press a firm kiss against his mouth. He pulls back and strips his shirt off, watching Dean watch him. His hands fall to his sweatpants and push them and his boxers down at once. He steps out of them and stands before Dean, naked.

Dean’s eyes trail from his face, to his chest, all the way down his body to his feet, then raise again before landing on his erect cock.

“Jesus,” Dean says. “You’re fucking hung.”

Cas reaches out and tilts Dean face up to him, looks him in the eyes.

“You don’t need to flatter me, Dean,” Cas says. Dean arches an eyebrow at him.

“I wasn’t,” Dean replies. “I mean, I haven’t been with that many guys, but none of ‘em were as big as you. It’s kinda intimidating.”

Cas's eyes narrow. Dean’s expression is too demure, his voice too innocent.

“You’re insufferable,” Cas says and Dean’s face melts into a smirk.

“I love a challenge,” Dean says and—

Holy fuck, he crawls forward and takes Cas’s cock into his mouth. Cas chokes on his own breath, his knees wobbling and threatening to give out on him. Cas’s hands go instinctively to Dean’s hair. He’s careful not to pull too hard—he doesn’t want to hurt Dean—but he can’t help how his fingers flex between the strands. The warmth and the wetness of Dean’s mouth around his cock is intoxicating.

In fact, it’s too intoxicating. The way Dean is sucking his dick, Cas realizes very quickly that he’s not going to last long if he keeps doing it. He can feel where his cock pulses in Dean’s mouth and—fuck, Dean moans around him and the vibrations of it shoot up his spine. Cas lets his head fall back, mouth hanging open, panting loud against the quiet of the room. His toes curl against the carpet and he can feel the crescendo building within him. Dean’s mouth is relentless and his hands are gripping the globes of Cas’s ass and—

Cas doesn’t think, moves purely on panic—he yanks hard against Dean’s hair, pulling him off of his dick. Cas squeezes his eyes shut, taking carefully controlled breaths. When he feels like he’s calmed down enough, he opens his eyes and looks down. Dean is gazing up at him, his lips swollen and red. There’s a string of spit connecting Dean’s mouth to his cock and Cas groans at the sight of it. His cockhead is purple and almost painful with how turned on he is. Seeing Dean looking at him like that—he watches as precome leaks over his slit and drips down his cock.

“Why’d you stop?” Dean says, and his voice is rougher than it usually is—Jesus Christ.

“I was going to come if you didn’t,” Cas says.

“So?” Dean says, eyes dark. “I wanna make you come.”

Cas relaxes his grip on Dean’s hair, cradles Dean’s cheek with his fingers. For a moment, he just revels in the way Dean’s looking at him with undisguised want.

“Not yet, Dean,” Cas says lowly. “I want to fuck you first.”

Dean surges up and clashes their lips together and—fuck, Cas can taste himself in the hollow of Dean’s mouth. Their tongues tangle together and Cas can’t get enough, he’ll never have enough.

“On the bed,” Cas rasps. Dean immediately obeys, positioning himself on his knees while his hands grip the headboard. He spreads his legs open, no hesitation, no shame, putting himself on display for Cas.

Cas quickly goes to the bedside table, wrenching open the drawers and fumbling around, searching, hoping—luckily, he finds it. Lube, in the bottom drawer. Thankfully unopened.

Cas clicks the lid open and gets on the bed behind Dean.

“You ever done this before?” Dean says, turning to look over his shoulder at Cas.

Cas hesitates. His experience with sex is fairly limited in practice—most of his knowledge is theoretical. And while he’s daydreamed about this exact scenario more times than he’ll ever admit, he doesn’t know the mechanics of what he’s doing. The people he’s had sex with in the past, they typically took control. For all of his bravado, this is new to Cas.

“No,” Cas says quietly. “Not this. Never—never when I’ve been on this end of things.”

“‘S okay, I have. I’ll show you,” Dean says. “Shit, you bottom? You don’t seem the type.”

That’s not really what Cas meant but it’s beside the point. Cas shrugs. The idea of that is equally as appealing as the idea of this. Any sex with Dean is sex he’s interested in.

“You’d be surprised,” Cas says idly. “I contain multitudes.”

Dean lets out a startled laugh at that. He crawls over to Cas and takes the lube out of his hands gently. He leans up and gives Cas a sweet kiss.

“Here,” Dean whispers, taking Cas’s hands in his. “Just follow my lead, ‘kay?”

“Okay,” Cas sighs out.

Cas never could have imagined he’d end up here: Dean guiding Cas’s hands, teaching him how to open Dean up with his fingers. The sounds Dean makes, the arch of his neck, his head thrown back. Cas is painfully hard as he works Dean open, never going too fast, never being too rough. He doesn’t want to hurt Dean.

Dean, though, doesn’t seem too concerned with that. In the span of no more than thirty minutes, he’s on his hands and knees, pushing himself back onto Cas’s fingers, head hanging heavy between his shoulders.

He’s beautiful like this—unrestrained in his pleasure, unashamed of his want. Cas wants to memorize the arc of his back and his wanton moans. He wants to engrain it in his memory forever.

“Cas, c’mon,” Dean groans. “‘M ready. Fuck me, please.”

Cas’s hand is slick with lube, running down to his wrist. Dean is thrusting back against three fingers and Cas can’t tear his eyes away from where their bodies are joining. His smooth, tan skin, the freckles on his back.

Cas withdraws his fingers, stilling Dean’s movement with a firm hand at his hip. He comes up close behind Dean, pressing their backs together. Pulls him up and Dean grips the headboard tightly. He arches against him, resting his head back on Cas’s shoulder. Cas touches their temples together, breathes him in.

“Please,” Dean whispers.

Cas wraps one arm around Dean’s chest and holds him close, while his other trails down. He grips his own cock in his hand, positions himself at Dean’s hole. He feels more than hears Dean’s breath catch as he slowly pushes the head of his cock inside him. Dean’s letting out these little whimpers and Cas squeezes his eyes shut, overwhelmed.

Inch by inch, Cas sinks deeper into Dean. The tight heat around his cock is goddamn immobilizing. The self-restraint it takes to stop himself from coming immediately is one of the hardest things Cas has ever done.

“Cas, come on,” Dean whines. Cas has never heard Dean sound like this, never seen him act like this. It’s enthralling. “C’mon, I’m not gonna break. Let me feel you.”

When Cas bottoms out, he takes a moment to let Dean adjust—despite what Dean says, Cas isn’t going to risk hurting him. He waits until he can feel Dean’s heartbeat steady out where his hand is pressed against Dean’s ribs.

“Tell me if it’s too much for you,” Cas husks against the shell of Dean’s ear.

“I can take it,” Dean insists, and Jesus Christ, Cas is liable for a goddamn stroke if Dean keeps going at this rate. “C’mon, man, I can take it. I want it. What, you gonna make me beg?”

Cas noses against the skin of Dean’s cheek. Takes one last moment to just cherish the way they're so close, the way they’re enjoined.

“No,” Cas says sweetly. “I won’t make you beg, Dean.”

With that, Cas pulls out before slamming back into Dean again. He sets a brutal pace, Dean keening against him, pushing back into him, letting out a long string of unintelligible curses and moans. The headboard thuds repeatedly against the wall and the slap of their skin meeting again and again only spurs Cas on more. He loves the sound they make when they’re together.

“Oh, fuck,” Dean cries and he reaches over his shoulder, knots his hand into Cas’s hair again, tugging, tugging, and Cas bites into the meat of Dean’s shoulder to muffle his shout. He drags his hand down Dean’s chest and takes his cock in hand, pumping it in time with his thrusts.

Dean clenches around him and Cas bites down harder, doesn’t think, can’t think through the sweet heat of Dean’s body, and it’s only when he tastes blood that he manages to wrench himself away.

“Fuck, I’m gonna come,” Dean pants. “God, fuck, I’m gonna come—I—I can’t—Oh, fuck—”

Cas’s balls are slapping against Dean’s ass with how franticly he’s fucking into him, and the air in the room goes thin and Cas’s vision is whiting out at the edges. In his peripheral, through his delirium, Cas can see the bedside lamp flickering wildly, and he knows he has to get himself under control before he wipes out the goddamn power in the entire house.

But his grace is flaring, reaching out towards Dean’s soul, and—he can’t stop it, he can’t help it, and he squeezes his eyes shut, can’t risk looking when he knows they’re glowing right now—but he can’t stop it, and he can’t slow down, because he’s reaching his peak, his balls drawing up tight to his body, his cock throbbing where he’s burying it in Dean, over and over again, and—

“Fuck!” Dean shouts, and Cas knows he must feel it, even if he doesn’t know what it is—Cas’s grace and Dean’s soul, meeting, binding, melding together, and—his whole being is alight, angel, human, it doesn’t matter, he can feel the warmth of Dean’s body in every dimension, and it’s like a drug, it’s like a revelation, and all at once Cas is afraid the sheer strength of his orgasm is going to kill him, and—

Dean leans forward and screams into the crook of his arm. His back arches, his body locks up, and he clamps down around Cas’s cock as he comes, and Cas only has the peace of mind to reach forward and slap his hand over Dean’s mouth as he wails through his orgasm.

Cas is so close, he can feel it, and he buries his face in the curve of Dean’s neck, hips pumping at a breakneck speed, and he’s almost there, he’s right at the edge, and—

Cas sobs against Dean’s throat, and heat erupts in his cock and out through the core of his body. He’s coming, he’s coming, deep inside Dean, and he keeps fucking into him, Dean whimpering against his hand, and Cas can’t fucking think. His mind blanks out and all he knows is bliss. All he knows is Dean.

Cas only stops when he physically can’t take it anymore. He slows, little by little, until he’s stilled to a stop. He can feel his cock softening inside Dean and he gulps in breath after breath, trying to calm his racing heart. His muscles are sore in a way they’ve never been sore before—probably because he’s been using them in a way they’ve never been used before. Cas leans his head against Dean’s, just trying to collect himself. His grace settles back in under the veil of his skin, pleased and purring like a fucking cat. Christ, where it had touched Dean’s soul—Cas hadn’t known it would feel like that. He hadn’t known anything could feel like that.

Cas only remembers he has a hand over Dean’s mouth when Dean’s fingers hook over the curve of his wrist and tug lightly.

“Shit,” Cas breathes, quickly pulling his hand away. Dean’s arms are trembling where they’re holding him up against the headboard. “I’m so sorry, Dean, I wasn’t thinking. Are you alright?”

Dean doesn’t verbally answer, just nods. He leans back against Cas’s shoulder, panting. His face is slack and blissed-out. Cas noses against him, pressing a kiss to his temple. His cheeks are flushed and his hair is slick with sweat. He looks goddamn beautiful.

“Are you okay?” Cas asks. “Was I too rough? Did I—was it too much?”

He worries at first that Dean won’t take it seriously but—Dean carefully extracts himself from Cas’s arms, gingerly lowering himself to sit on the bed. Cas follows his lead, until they’re facing each other. Dean meets his gaze, his eyes half-lidded and a small smile curling at his lips.

“I’m okay,” Dean says softly. “I just need a minute. Fuck.” He huffs out a laugh and runs a shaky hand through his hair. “Where the hell did you learn to fuck like that?”

“Um,” Cas says, drawing a blank. It’s distracting, the way Dean’s freckles are more prominent when his face is red. Cas can’t stop looking at them. “I didn’t. You just brought it out in me.”

“I bet you say that to all the guys,” Dean teases. Cas just huffs out a laugh, shaking his head. Unbearably fond.

“Come here,” Cas says gently. He pulls Dean down with him, into an embrace. He reaches down to pull the disheveled covers over top of them and clicks off the bedside lamp, leaving them in darkness. Cradling Dean in his arms, with Dean’s head in the curve of his neck, sleep cloaks Cas like a warm blanket, and he’s lost to the world.

Minutes or hours later—Cas has no way of knowing how much time has passed—Cas startles awake. He doesn’t know what woke him up, he only knows he was wrenched from a dark and disturbing dream.

It takes a moment for Cas to remember the events of last night, but when he does, all the color drains from his face. Guilt settles like a lead weight in his stomach. Cas turns his head to the side and, through the dark of the room, there: Dean, curled against him, snoring softly.

For a while, Cas just looks at him. He lets his eyes roam freely over the lines of Dean’s face. His freckles, his eyelashes, the contour of his cheekbones and the curve of his lips. The purpling bite mark where Cas sunk his teeth into the meat of Dean's shoulder. He’s so gorgeous, he’s so good to Cas, he’s perfect, he’s—

He’s not his. This Dean is not his.

For the first time since he fell into bed with Dean, Cas lets himself think about his Dean. Rough around the edges, soul scorched from hellfire, incredible, spiteful, loyal, beautiful Dean. He knows his Dean is long lost to him. He knows they’ll never meet again, except for maybe in Cas’s daydreams. He knows his Dean never asked for nor wanted Cas’s affections—and he knows he never would’ve given them to Dean. Dean never would’ve allowed it.

And if his Dean knew what Cas just did—if he knew—

Hot tears roll unbidden down Cas’s cheeks. He carefully sets Dean down, laying him softly against the pillows. Dragging himself to the edge of the mattress, Cas sits hunched over, head in his hands. Wondering how the hell he let himself get into this situation.

Cas doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to conclude how this happened. But he knows one thing for certain: it can never happen again.

Chapter Text

Cas awakes to a wall of warmth along his side and his right arm tingling with pins and needles.

Opening his eyes takes more effort than it’s taken in a while. At first, he contemplates letting the dark behind his eyelids lure him back into sleep. It’s tempting. But he knows he has to get up eventually.

And, his arm. When he finally peels open his eyes, squinting against the light streaming in through the curtains, his gaze falls on Dean. Curled up against him. Dean’s shoulder is pressing into Cas’s right arm—hence the pins and needles. Cas knows he should ask Dean to move but he’s loath to wake him up. He looks so beautiful like this. At peace.

Like all good things, it ends far too soon. Dean’s brow furrows and his eyes flutter open. Cas belatedly thinks that Dean will probably be upset with him for staring but he can’t bring himself to care. He knows what needs to come next and—it isn’t easy for him. None of this is.

“Hey,” Dean croaks, voice rough against the quiet of the morning. “What time is it?”

“It’s early,” Cas says softly, glancing over his shoulder at the digital clock on the bedside dresser. “Almost seven.”

“Thank god,” Dean mumbles, burrowing further into Cas’s side. “‘M going back to sleep.”

“Dean,” Cas whispers.

“Hmm?” Dean hums.

“I can’t feel my arm.”

Dean squints one eye open before raising himself up on his elbows.

“Sorry,” Dean says, smiling unapologetically. “You’re a pretty good pillow.”

“I’m glad,” Cas says. “We should talk.”

“Yeah, I figured you’d say that,” Dean says, letting out a sigh. He settles back against one of the pillows, tucking his hands behind his head. He turns to face Cas, holding his gaze easily. There’s no regret there, no trepidation. Dean seems utterly relaxed and—Cas supposes that makes sense. Because last night didn’t mean to Dean what it meant to Cas. And it’s not fair to hold this Dean to the standard of his Dean but—he can’t help it. And he can’t pretend that casual sex is something he can do with Dean Winchester.

“This can’t happen again,” Cas says evenly. His hands are trembling where they’re clenched in the bedsheets. “Last night was—it’s not something I usually do.”

“What d’you mean?” Dean says.

“I mean that I don’t engage in casual sex often. Or ever, really. So this—it can’t happen again. Do you understand?”

Still, Dean’s expression remains the same—if anything, he seems almost amused.

“What, you’re telling me you didn’t have a good time last night?” Dean says.

“Of course I did,” Cas says patiently. “That’s not the point, Dean.”

“Well, then what is?” Dean challenges, raising an eyebrow. “I mean—if you had a good time, and I had a good time, then I don’t see what the big deal is.”

“Listen to me, Dean,” Cas says carefully. “I don’t do casual and I don’t love lightly. When I give my love, I devote myself to my partner. And I expect the same in return. You said last night that—it didn’t have to mean anything. I’m not comfortable with that—not long-term. And I understand if that’s something you don’t want. I’ll respect your boundaries, Dean, so long as you respect mine.”

“Wait, hold up,” Dean says. He sits up, arms resting on his knees, and he’s so beautiful in his casual nudity. His lack of self-consciousness, his natural grace. Cas wishes Dean knew how it kills him to walk away from this. “So you’re saying you—what? You wanna be my boyfriend or somethin’?”

“Sure,” Cas sighs. That’s one way to put it.

“And if you’re not, then we can’t fuck again?”

“Exactly,” Cas says.

“What, you never heard of friends with benefits?”

“I’m aware of that,” Cas says. “And I have no interest in it. I told you, I don’t do casual.”

“Define casual,” Dean says.

“Dean,” Cas warns.

“Well—come on, man,” Dean chuckles, but his brow is furrowed and he almost sounds frustrated now. “Try to see it from my point of view, yeah? No one’s ever fucked me like that and now you’re telling me you don’t wanna do it again. Kinda hard not to take that personally. Besides, can you really blame me for wanting this to happen again?”

“It’s not that I don’t want it,” Cas insists. “But I—” Cas cuts himself off, running a hand through his hair.

“You what? Don’t like sharing?”

“Something like that,” Cas says. “The point is, if we’re going to do this again, then we need to be together. Exclusive,” Cas adds. He can’t remember where he first heard the term—maybe Claire. But it definitely applies here.

“I still don’t get what that has to do with great sex,” Dean snarks, crossing his arms.

And—Cas gets it, is the thing. And it’s his own damn fault Dean sees it that way. Because—to Dean, Cas is just some guy he met a few months ago that he apparently finds attractive. Dean has no idea how deep this runs for Cas.

“Let me ask you something, Dean,” Cas starts. “Would you like to go on dates with me? To kiss me goodnight? To tell your family we’re together? Do you enjoy the thought of being mine? Or—do you just want sex? For me, the former is a requisite for the latter. That’s just who I am.”

Dean stays quiet, huffing to himself, but Cas knows. He knows.

“Why don’t you take a few days to think about it,” Cas says quietly. “Then give me your answer. I don’t need one right away. But—until you do, we can’t have sex again.”

“Woah, woah, woah, let’s not make any rash decisions,” Dean says and—it’s sweet, it’s agony, it’s blissful torture. Finally, Cas has found himself in a situation where Dean wants him—where Dean is asking him to stay. And now that he finally has that—he can’t.

Cas reaches out, rests the palm of his hand against the curve of Dean’s cheek. His hand fits so perfectly, like it was made to cradle Dean’s face, and Cas aches.

“You’re sweet,” Cas mutters. “I like being around you, Dean. And I greatly enjoyed being intimate with you. Don’t think I’m doing this because I don’t want you. I do. I hope you don’t think less of me for it.”

Dean opens his mouth but hesitates. The furrow in his brow deepens. He seems to catch on, then, that Cas is upset, because he quickly drops his joking tone and matches Cas’s seriousness. Cas loves him all the more for it.

“Why would I?” Dean says quietly. “You do that a lot, you know—you keep assuming that you caring bothers me.”

“I suppose it’s habit,” Cas whispers. “Forgive me. I don’t know how to not do it.”

“Jeez,” Dean breathes, but his voice and gaze is gentle. “Someone fucked you up bad, huh? Stop thinking I’m gonna freak out every time you’re nice to me, man. That’s not who I am.”

There’s a lump in Cas’s throat and hot tears burning at his eyes. Nonetheless, Cas can feel a tug on the corner of his mouth. Wonderful, beautiful Dean.

“I know it’s not,” Cas says. “I’m sorry, I—I haven’t been with anybody for a long, long time, Dean. And the last man I was with—” Cas flinches minutely, thinking back to the dungeon. “It didn’t end well.”

“Thought he died,” Dean says carefully.

“It was worse than that,” Cas says. “But it doesn’t matter now. I can’t change the past.”

“Look, I—I get it, okay? The wanting a relationship thing, I mean. I know casual sex ain’t for everybody. Thing is—it’s all I really do. And I’m not exactly relationship material, Cas.”

“Mm, I disagree,” Cas says softly. “But perhaps I’m more fond of you than you are of me.”

“You’re doing it again,” Dean points out. Cas smiles at him helplessly.

“Sorry,” Cas says even though he isn’t. With a heavy sigh, he finally pulls away from Dean, letting his hand drop down. Dean frowns at him, his mouth downturned. Cas didn’t want to upset him but—he doesn’t know how else to do this. Perhaps it was going to hurt regardless of how he framed it. Rejection doesn’t feel good for anybody.

“You should go,” Cas says, feels like he’s dying, like he has to claw the words out through his throat. “Before the others wake up.”

For a moment, Dean just looks at him, his gaze searching. His beautiful eyes. His soul pulses quietly, hurt. Cas thinks of his grace and Dean’s soul, how sweetly they had joined together last night. It’s like there’s a gaping cavern in his chest now and Cas—wants. And it’s just like him, isn’t it? To want the one thing he can’t have?

Except—he can have it. But not in the way he needs it.

Maybe Chuck was right about him after all.

“Okay,” Dean says finally, voice quiet. “I’ll go if you want me to go. But I think you’re wrong, Cas.” He sounds more determined as he goes on, his movements grow more confident. Dean runs a gentle hand down Cas’s chest and Cas’s heart stutters.

“I think you want me,” Dean says. “You say we can’t have sex again? Well, I think you won’t be able to stay away from me. You’re not the only one who’s mastered the art of seduction.”

“I never claimed to,” Cas says.

“Baby, the way you fuck? You don’t need to.”

Cas flushes all the way down to his chest, trying to hide how pleased he is to hear Dean say that.

Dean sees it anyway, eyes gleaming and smile triumphant.

“I don’t know what you’re planning, Dean,” Cas says, voice remarkably even given the bedroom eyes Dean is currently giving him. “But it’s not going to work. And I meant what I said. We’re not having sex again. Not unless we agree to be exclusive.”

“Mm,” Dean hums. “Yeah, we’ll see about that.”

Dean sends him one more sultry smile before he climbs out of bed, slow enough that Cas knows it’s purposeful. Watching the way the light reflects off of Dean’s bare skin, his lithe body, naked for Cas to see—Cas bites his lip thoughtlessly. Dean always looks so good, so beautiful, and it doesn’t hurt to look, does it?

It damn near kills him to watch Dean gather his clothes and sway out of the room. It gives him a great view of Dean’s ass, though.

When Dean told Cas that he had mastered the art of seduction, he wasn’t exaggerating. Cas learns this the hard way.

And the worst part is, Dean does it so subtly, that Cas almost wonders if he’s doing it on purpose at all.

It starts with little things: Dean pressing up against his back when he’s making coffee, with the excuse of needing to reach over him to the cupboard; hooking his ankle around Cas’s beneath the dining table and looking into his eyes while he’s sipping his coffee; laughing too hard at Cas’s dumb jokes and giving him bedroom eyes from across the room.

On one hand, Cas preens under such rapt attention from Dean; tracking his movements, gauging his expressions, watching to see if his seduction is working. Cas has never longed for anything more than for Dean to want Cas to want him. This Dean is so young, he’s so carefree, and his soul is so goddamned beautiful—it pulses in triumph every time Cas’s face flushes or he trips over his words.

On the other hand, this is far from a game to Cas. His wanting Dean has never been something he’s tried to quantify but he knows what Dean feels for him right now is nothing compared to what he feels for Dean. And it’s unfair of him to expect anything different but he can’t change how he loves Dean. And he can’t make Dean fall in love with him.

The rollercoaster of emotions—arousal, frustration, fondness, longing—it’s exhausting for Cas to keep up with it all that first morning. Dean will surely be the death of him at this rate.

Not that there’s any other way Cas would want to die.

Given Cas’s—ahem, preoccupation—that morning with how Dean is distracting him, when the others approach him about last night, it genuinely takes him by surprise.

“So, Cas,” Jo says carefully. There’s a blush across her cheeks but she also looks amused. They’re all gathered around the dining table eating breakfast, and Cas has only been half-listening to the conversation because Dean’s been trailing his foot up Cas’s leg for the better part of a half hour and it’s—distracting.

“Hmm?” Cas hums.

“Not to rain or your parade or anything, but next time you bring someone over, can you maybe keep it down a little bit?”

Cas promptly inhales his coffee. He can feel his face flush hotly, all the blood in his body immediately rushing to his cheeks, and he forces himself to not look at Dean. Dean, whose leg has completely stopped, frozen against Cas’s under the table.

When Cas can finally fucking breathe again, he clears his throat, unsure. Glances around at the others—Ellen is biting back a smirk and Bobby is rolling his eyes, arms crossed. Sam huffs but he’s blushing, too, scratching at the back of his head awkwardly, the way he does when he’s uncomfortable and needs to do something with his hands. Cas pointedly does not look to see what Dean’s face looks like right now.

“I’m…sorry?” Cas ventures carefully.

“Look, son, we don’t care if you bring people over,” Bobby says gruffly. “But you ain’t exactly quiet. And I don’t ever wanna hear that shit again.”

The sheer mortification is unlike anything Cas has ever felt.

But—they don’t seem to know who Cas was with.

“It won’t happen again,” Cas says quietly, not daring to meet Dean’s gaze where he can feel it resting on him from across the table.

“I take it he’s already gone,” Ellen offers, raising an eyebrow at him.

“Yes,” Cas says because he has no idea what else he’s supposed to do.

“Well, next time, you can invite him to stay for breakfast,” Ellen says, shrugging. “So long as you don’t wake us all up again.”

Cas hides his face in his hands briefly, taking deep breaths, trying to rein in his humiliation.

Jesus Christ, if they knew who Cas was fucking—if they ever found out—

Nope, he isn’t going to think about that. Not happening.

“We’re not trying to embarrass you, you know,” Ellen says. “But I could hear your headboard banging against the wall from upstairs and I don’t need to hear that.”

Cas groans, dropping his head to the table. This day really just keeps getting worse.

“Hope he was worth it,” Jo says, her voice laced with humor. Cas looks up from his hands and into her eyes. She’s smirking unabashedly now.

“Well, I’m glad this is so amusing to you, Jo,” Cas says crossly. “I’ve never been so humiliated.”

“Oh, please,” Jo says, scoffing. “Nothing to be embarrassed about. At least one of us is getting laid.”

“Jo,” Ellen warns.

“It’s true,” Jo says defensively. “Besides, this is probably the funniest way we could’ve found out Cas is seeing someone.”

“I’m not,” Cas cuts in awkwardly. “Look, it was—I don’t want you to think I’m the type of person to bring someone into your home without asking. It was…um, spur of the moment. Believe me, it won’t happen again.”

“Whatever you say,” Bobby says. “So long as I don’t gotta hear it again, it don’t matter to me.”

“Yeah,” Cas sighs, rubbing a tired hand down his face. “It won’t be a problem. You have my word.”

Dean doesn’t say another word to him the rest of breakfast.

The following days are fraught with a tension Cas is desperate to get rid of. He knows he misjudged Dean—and what this means to him. Because the morning after they had sex, it became abundantly clear that for Dean’s blase remarks about casual sex and all his easy confidence, he was not comfortable with the others knowing what happened between them. Cas has no way to know if it’s because it’s him, or because he’s a man.

He doesn’t know but he can’t take this horrible fucking stalemate any longer, so three days later, the last thread of his patience snaps and he corners Dean when he’s sitting on the porch smoking a cigarette.

Dean huffs when Cas takes a seat beside him but still offers him the cigarette. Cas takes it gingerly—he doesn’t think he’s ever seen Dean smoke before. Maybe his Dean quit before he met Cas.

“Nobody knows,” Cas says around the smoke in his mouth. It’s a statement, not a question, and he doesn’t have to clarify what he’s referring to. Dean’s face is carefully blank and he’s gone stock-still beside Cas.

“No,” Dean says carefully. “Look, I don’t go around advertising it, alright? If you wanna scream from the rooftops that you’re gay, then fine. I don’t give a shit, that’s your choice. But that’s not who I am.”

Cas passes the cigarette back to Dean, thinking quietly.

“What isn’t?” Cas says. “Being queer? Or being proud of it?”

Now Dean looks irritated—his brow furrowed, jaw clenched, he turns bright eyes on Cas, his voice hard.

“Not everybody has a family that’s cool with that kind of thing, man. You don’t get to judge me for keeping it to myself.”

“I’m not judging you, Dean,” Cas says. “But you’re making a lot of assumptions about me. Did you ever stop to wonder why I don’t speak to my family anymore? I don’t scream it from the rooftops. You are the first people I’ve told who have supported me. I’m not with my family because they don’t. Did that ever occur to you?”

Dean goes quiet then, looking away from Cas’s gaze. He fiddles with the cigarette, suddenly seeming unsure.

“You never said,” Dean says quietly. Cas shrugs. He isn’t trying to upset Dean—that’s the last thing he wants.

He just wants them to be on the same page for once.

“We all have things we don’t talk about, Dean. But this is something I refuse to feel ashamed about. I’ve come too far for that. I won’t let anyone make me feel badly for who I am—not anymore.”

Something shifts in Dean’s face—some kind of understanding.

“That night,” Dean says slowly. “When you told me about your dad a couple weeks ago. How he treated you—was it because…?”

“Because I’m gay?” Cas says and Dean nods. “It was more complicated than that, but yes, Dean.”

Cas knows it’s not the exact or whole truth, but it’s the closest approximation he can give. He doesn’t want to misrepresent to Dean his experience with something that he knows Dean must also have suffered through in the past—but he supposes God’s loathing of humanity—or, at the very least, of Dean and his defiance—is not dissimilar to homophobia. Same sentiment, different type of anger. The end result is the same, though.

“Oh,” Dean whispers. “I didn’t—I had no idea.”

Cas studies Dean carefully. His face is drawn and his shoulders are tense and—Cas knows he shouldn’t, he doesn’t want to risk upsetting Dean further, but he needs to know.

“Dean,” Cas begins quietly. “I know it’s not my place to ask but—I do wonder. Sam doesn’t seem to have a problem with gay people. Neither does Bobby or Ellen or Jo. You said your family wouldn’t support you. Who exactly is it you’re referring to?”

Dean won’t look at him. For a long, tense moment, there’s only silence, and Dean sits stiff-limbed, tight-lipped. Cas almost immediately regrets asking. He should know better.

“Forgive me,” Cas says softly. “I shouldn’t have asked. I won’t again.”

Cas rises to his feet to leave—Dean clearly isn’t happy with him right now and he doesn’t want to make it worse.

“Wait,” Dean says suddenly. Cas looks down and—Dean is looking at him now. His expression is unreadable but his hands are clenched into fists in his lap. The cigarette lay smoldering, forgotten, on the porch step. Cas slowly sits again. He watches Dean carefully from the corner of his eye but Dean isn’t meeting his gaze anymore. They sit together in the silence until Cas loses track of time, but he doesn’t get up to leave again, and Dean doesn’t tell him to go.

Minutes or hours later—Cas has no idea—Dean finally speaks again.

“When you told your dad you’re gay,” Dean says slowly. “What did he—how did he react?”

Cas bites his lip, considering. Thinks back Chuck’s rage. His confrontation. The winding, twisting hallways of the bunker and the fate of the universe hanging in the balance. And how, through all of that, all that was on the line, Chuck made a point to comment on Cas’s feelings for Dean.

“I didn’t tell him,” Cas says. “He found out.” Cas hesitates, tries to think of the best way to explain it so Dean will understand. “I fell in love with a man and my family caught on very quickly. They saw how I acted around him. Frankly, I think they knew it before I did. It was—I didn’t always know, Dean. It was only when I met him that I understood. Even then, it was years of me not comprehending the extent of my feelings.”

Cas sighs quietly, feeling a fine tremble begin in his hands.

“By the time I realized I was in love with him, I’d been tolerating my family’s abuse for years. Their resentment. Their disgust. They’d long given me an ultimatum. They made it clear it was him or them. I just didn’t realize until after I’d chosen him, why I had done it.”

“Did you ever regret it?” Dean asks. Cas meets his gaze then, holds it steadily. The green of Dean’s eyes and the writhing of his soul—Cas wants.

“Not once,” Cas says. “I never will. Choosing him was the best choice I’ve ever made. Because I didn’t just choose him—I chose me, too. I chose to be true to myself rather than to please my family. I know who I am, Dean. And nobody—not even my father, who I once loved more than anybody in the universe—gets to make me feel ashamed of that.”

“You say that like it’s easy,” Dean says, scoffing. There’s an undercurrent of anger in Dean’s voice but Cas gets the feeling it isn’t directed at him. “I don’t get how you do that, man. How the hell does it not bother you? I mean, he’s your father.”

“What do you think holds more weight to me, Dean?” Cas says quietly. “Which do you think I value more? Someone’s contempt, or someone’s kindness? I had the former in spades from my family, to the point where I can’t remember what it was like when they loved me. Sometimes I question whether they ever truly did. The latter, I’ve only ever received in any meaningful way from the man I loved. To be loved so much, so sincerely, that it not only changes you, but betters you? I didn’t know a gentle touch until I met him. My loyalty to my father was formidable but it didn’t keep me in comfort, Dean. Loving him felt like finally loving myself.”

And, Christ, it feels so good to say it, to even just say it aloud, even when Dean doesn’t know what it means. 

Dean’s eyes are wet and his cheeks are flushed but he’s looking at Cas like he trusts him. Cas reaches out tentatively, brushes Dean’s hair out of his eyes, cupping his face briefly in his palm.

“The day you decide to prioritize the love you’re given rather than the rejection is the day you show yourself true kindness,” Cas says softly. “I pray you’ll be kind to yourself, Dean. No one deserves to feel ashamed of who they are. Especially not someone so tender-hearted as you.”

Tears run down Dean’s face and wet Cas’s hand but he can’t bring himself to pull away. Dean’s hand curls around Cas’s wrist, but his grip is gentle, loose. Cas lets his thumb wipe away the tears on Dean’s cheek. Dean’s eyes flutter closed and he leans into Cas’s palm.

When Dean’s eyes open again, some indeterminable amount of time later, he looks right at Cas. There’s something soft in his expression that Cas hasn’t seen in a long time. He’s looking at Cas the way his Dean used to look at him, Cas realizes. Like he’s fond, like he’s his best friend, like he's proud of him. Cas can’t look away, doesn’t want to.

“You sure have a way with words, huh,” Dean whispers. “You keep surprising me, Cas.”

“Do I?” Cas whispers back. “I’ve been told I’m predictable.”

“Not to me,” Dean says and Cas aches. “Why’re you so nice to me?”

Cas can’t help the fond expression on his face, lets himself gaze at Dean, just reveling in the beauty of his soul.

“Oh, I can’t help it,” Cas says. “Don’t act like you don’t know how charming you are. Surely you know by now.”

“Sure,” Dean says, lips curling into a smile. “But for what it’s worth, I ain’t trying. Usually I gotta pull out all the stops to charm someone.”

“I don’t believe that for a moment,” Cas says lightly, stroking the soft skin of Dean’s cheek with his thumb. “You’re very beautiful. I don’t think you need to try at all. At least not with me.”

“Jesus, Cas,” Dean mutters and his face grows warm beneath Cas’s palm. He doesn’t pull away, though. “You wanna talk about charming? I don’t know how you come up with this shit. You’re killing me, man.”

“I can stop, if you like,” Cas offers.

“I didn’t say that,” Dean says. “You just—first you tell me we can’t have sex again. And then you act all noble and philosophical and shit, as if that ain’t super hot. I think I’m getting some mixed signals here, man.”

“I disagree,” Cas says, though he can see how it appears that way to Dean. “I’ve made it very clear to you that I’d like a relationship with you, Dean. You know casual sex is not something I’m interested in. I believe the term is—the ball’s in your court now.”

“You’re such a dork,” Dean snorts. “Besides, didn’t I already tell you I’m just gonna seduce you?”

“Hmm,” Cas hums. “Well, consider me seduced. I’m still not having sex with you, though.”

“Tease,” Dean says but he’s smiling. And this—is really nice, actually. Being able to talk to Dean about this, to be candid about his queerness. To not have to hide his attraction or his affection for Dean, even if Dean doesn’t know its true extent. This is something Cas didn’t have before. He isn’t going to take it for granted, now that he does.

And if this is all he ever gets from Dean—his friendship, his trust, his want, even from a distance, even if they can’t act on it—Cas will gladly take it.

It’s more than Cas has ever gotten before, and it’s far more than he deserves from Dean.

Dean and Cas’s stalemate lasts the rest of the week, reaching its peak on Halloween night. After their talk, Dean goes back to trying to seduce Cas, but the tension between them has fallen away and it’s all in good fun. Cas can’t begrudge Dean for it, not when he gets treated to Dean’s hand at the small of his back and that mesmerizing smile directed his way. Cas basks in every brush of their shoulders, every flirtatious quip. It’s invigorating, and it’s euphoric, to be the center of Dean’s attention like this. To be something that Dean wants.

The night before Halloween, Bobby comes to them with a case. Demons again—the first case of demons since Cas’s run-in with Alastair. Bobby and Ellen had tracked the nest to an old abandoned apartment building smack-dab in the center of town. The nest is small, only five in total from what they could tell. If they’re careful about it—if they don’t make the same mistakes they made before—they can take out the demons, no problem.

They plan to attack the nest on Halloween night—whatever noise they make in doing so should be offset by the general ruckus of the town’s festivities and the local families going trick-or-treating. Besides, they’re planning to lure the demons to the far edge of town, away from the general population, just to be safe. Separate the nest and take them out, one by one.

It’s a good plan and it’s one Cas is confident in.

Of course, it doesn’t go the way it’s supposed to. Nothing ever does anymore.

Cas can’t say for sure how it happens because, the truth is, everything goes very well at first.

They split into two groups: one group consists of Cas, Sam, and Dean, and one group consists of Bobby, Ellen, and Jo. It’s not lost on Cas, what it means for Bobby to trust Cas with his boys. Cas, Sam, and Dean are responsible for two of the five demons, and Bobby, Ellen, and Jo take on the other three. Equipped with holy water, the demon knife, and a book of exorcisms, they lure the demons out into an abandoned courtyard, far from any signs of life. They’re not risking any collateral damage and they’re going to do this right. Cas is on one far end of the courtyard with the Winchesters while Bobby and the Harvelles are on the other.

Cas, Sam, and Dean kill their two demons quickly enough. Sam has a cut running along his cheek and Dean bent his wrist back at an odd angle, but they’re okay. On the other side of the yard, they can see the others have killed two of their demons but are struggling with the last one.

And that’s where it seems to fall apart.

They regroup with Bobby, Ellen, and Jo; Ellen tosses the demon knife to Dean when he calls for it, strides up to the last demon with unwavering confidence and focus. Cas can tell it’s hurting; smoke rising off it’s flesh from holy water, limping slightly, its teeth are bared in a growl and Cas can see the frantic pulse of its scorched soul; it’s afraid, Cas realizes, but he can’t bring himself to feel sorry for it. The nest has been killing innocent civilians. They don’t have a choice here.

And when Dean goes to stab the demon and send it back to hell once and for all, it lashes out in its desperation—Cas realizes too late what’s about to happen. And he can’t stop the demon but he can protect Dean. Sometimes Cas thinks that’s all he knows how to do.

The demon grapples the knife from Dean’s hand and—Cas can see out of the corner of his eye that he isn’t the only one that is throwing himself towards Dean, he can see Sam reach out to him and Bobby is fast on his feet; but Cas is quicker than all of them, draws minutely on his grace, and launches himself in front of Dean.

Just in time, too; the serrated edge of the demon blade slices through his jacket and down into the skin of his left arm. Cas winches, gritting his teeth, blocking Dean with his body. Dean lets out a startled sound against him, his eyes wide.

Cas doesn’t wait; he wrenches the knife back from the demon, hitting him hard across the face. Maybe he uses more force than any human could, but it doesn’t matter, because Dean is in danger; and before the demon can react, he plunges the knife into its chest. It wails as it descends back to hell. Its body drops to the ground, hollow.

Cas lets out a heavy breath. Blood is running thick down his arm. He inspects it with critical eyes; nothing too debilitating, but he knows any human would be in a serious amount of pain right now, so he clenches his jaw and clutches at his upper arm; puts on a show because he needs to. Feels like shit for lying anyway.

“Holy shit,” Sam breathes from behind him. Bobby quickly removes his jacket and wraps it around the length of Cas’s arm.

“Take it easy there, son,” Bobby says. “Let’s get you back and sew this up.”

Dean remains silent but when Cas looks at him, his eyes are bright and his jaw is clenched. He’s upset, Cas realizes. Great.

The drive back to Bobby’s is filled with quiet chatter from the others. It still catches him off guard, even now, how they always seem so surprised when he protects one of them. Perhaps they still need to get used to it but it hurts Cas in a way he can’t quite articulate. He wants it to be normal, is the thing. He wants it to be so normal that they expect it, rather than appreciate it. But he supposes that kind of thing will take time.

Cas lets the others patch him up. Dean disappears to his room and Cas can’t bring himself to go after him. He’s exhausted, frankly, and he doesn’t even know why Dean is so mad at him. He can deal with it later, he decides. Right now, he just wants to get out of his blood-stained clothes.

“There you are, stranger,” Ellen says with a sigh. There’s a neat row of stitches along his left arm. Cas flexes his hand, tests the durability of the stitches—they stay put. They aren’t necessarily painful but they do itch a little. “Give it a couple weeks and we can take them out.”

“Thank you, Ellen,” Cas says softly.

“Don’t mention it,” Ellen says, waving him off. “In fact, we should be thanking you.”

“That’s not necessary,” Cas says awkwardly. While he appreciates their gratitude he doesn’t really know what to do with it.

“Seriously, Cas,” Sam says quietly. “Thank you—for protecting Dean, I mean. You keep throwing yourself in front of knives for us.”

Cas shrugs.

“I’m fine, really. It’s just a cut. Believe me, I’ve had a lot worse.”

Sam shakes his head at him but he’s smiling, too.

“Try ‘n get some rest,” Bobby says. “Maybe you can actually go a full week without getting hacked up.”

“That’s not fair,” Cas protests. “This is only the second time that’s happened.”

“You mean it’s only the second time you’ve gotten stabbed?” Jo says. “Not a great track record, Cas.”

“I think you’re all being dramatic,” Cas grumbles. Ellen smirks and pats him on the shoulder.

“Go get some sleep,” she says. “You’ll feel better in the morning.”

Cas retreats to his room with every intention to do just that.

Of course, that doesn’t go the way he plans either.

When a soft knock comes at Cas’s door no more than twenty minutes after he goes to his room, Cas knows immediately that it’s Dean. He knows he shouldn’t answer it because it can’t bring anything good. But he’s never been able to deny Dean anything—especially when Dean is the one asking.

“Come in,” Cas calls out, resigned to his fate. He’s really not in the mood for an argument but when Dean steps into his room, firmly closing the door behind him, Cas can tell by the look on his face that that’s why Dean is here.

“We need to talk,” Dean says. His posture is rigid and there’s tension in the line of his shoulders. Jaw clenched, eyes narrowed, Cas knows this tune by now. And frankly, he really doesn’t want to do this. He’s still in his bloody clothes, and he wants a hot shower and maybe a nap.

“Of course we do,” Cas grouses. “Look, Dean, I understand you’re upset with me for whatever reason, but can we not do this right now? It’s late, I’m tired, and I’d like to get ready for bed.”

“For whatever reason,” Dean parrots and his voice is hard. “Are you fucking kidding me?” He scoffs, sounding incredulous, and Cas doesn’t know what Dean wants from him anymore.

“Just say what you’re going to say and go, Dean,” Cas says. “I don’t want to do this with you.”

“Y’know what? Fine,” Dean snaps. He crosses the room, standing tall in front of Cas, all confrontation and hard lines, but Cas knows him too well. He can see right through it. “All the flirting and shit, I enjoy it, alright? But we can’t keep doing it if you’re gonna pull shit like this! And you sure as hell can’t put yourself in danger for me like that!”

For a moment, Cas is rendered speechless. Frustration, offense on his own behalf, bubbles low in his gut. Cas clenches his hands into fists, teeth grinding and heart thudding hard in his chest.

“Oh,” Cas says sourly. “Is that what you think this is? What, you thought I was doing it to impress you? Let me make this very clear to you, Dean: I don’t put myself between others and danger as some kind of fucking party trick. I protected you because you’re my friend, Dean, not because I expect something in return. And frankly, it pisses me off that you think so lowly of me—that you would assume that, what? I let myself get stabbed because I think it’s romantic? Fuck you, Dean.”

Cas goes to walk away—he’s only getting worked up and he really doesn’t want to get in a shouting match with Dean—but Dean stops him with a hand on his shoulder, and Cas bites his tongue bloody holding back everything he wants to say in that moment. He faces Dean, head-on, the way he always has, because he knows Dean.

“What the hell else am I supposed to think?” Dean says, his fingers biting hard into Cas’s shoulder. “I mean, Jesus Christ, Cas, you say all this lovey-dovey shit to me, waxing poetic or whatever, and then you throw yourself in front of a fucking knife for me! Not many ways you can misinterpret that, man. And I’m not stupid, so don’t act like I am.”

“Oh, I don’t think you’re stupid, Dean,” Cas says, voice deceptively sweet, his anger thrumming beneath the surface of his skin. “I think that your opinion of yourself is so low that somehow you turn a normal gesture of kindness into some kind of declaration of love. Tell me, Dean: what is it like to hate yourself so much that someone protecting you is somehow offensive?”

Cas regrets it the moment the words leave his mouth. But this—this is something Cas has always dealt with, is the thing: Dean’s refusal to believe he’s worthy, his self-loathing poisoning every gesture of affection Cas could make. And he’s tired of it, he’s so, so tired of Dean’s own self-hatred coloring all of their interactions. He hates that Dean hates himself and he hates that he has no way to make it better.

“Fuck you,” Dean spits out. His face is contorted in anger but there’s hurt there, too, and he shoves roughly against Cas’s chest. Cas stumbles back a step, momentarily stunned. “You don’t get to tell me what I think about myself,” Dean says heatedly. “And you sure as hell don’t get to tell me I’m imagining things. I’m not fucking blind, Cas, and I’m not a kid, either. I see how you look at me. I know you like me. Why the fuck do you have to act like you don’t?”

“I’m not the one who acts like that, Dean,” Cas growls. “You’re the one who wouldn’t back off. I told you I wanted a relationship and you made a joke out of it. You flirt with me but you never follow through. So tell me, Dean: who’s leading on who?”

“Oh, please,” Dean scoffs. “What, you’re mad that I was flirting? Well, I didn’t see you complaining.”

“You started this, Dean,” Cas says. “You came onto me. If you didn’t want my affection, then you shouldn’t have kissed me. And you don’t get to only be okay with me caring about you when it impacts you in a way you like!”

“In a way I like?” Dean says. “You got yourself fucking stabbed, Cas! And it could’ve been a lot worse! You think I want your blood on my hands? I fucking don’t. I have enough people to worry about. I don’t need to worry about you, too.”

“Then don’t!” Cas shouts. “If you don’t want to care about me, then don’t, Dean!”

“I can’t help it!” Dean shouts back and—Cas stops, heart stuttering in his chest. Suddenly his face feels hot and his throat is thick with tears and he doesn’t want to yell at Dean anymore. He isn’t even mad. He’s just hurting.

For a moment, Dean just looks at him, eyes glassy and chest heaving. Cas feels time slow down—that pinpoint. He’s familiar with it by now, knows everything is going to change. Knows he’s powerless against it.

And when Dean steps forward to kiss him, Cas is powerless against that, too.

It’s painful, bordering on too rough, where their lips meet, teeth clashing, biting down on swollen bottom lips. But Cas matches Dean beat for beat, until he can taste blood on his tongue and he doesn’t know if it’s his or Dean’s. 

It all spirals from there. Soon Dean is unbuttoning Cas’s shirt and Cas’s hands slide beneath Dean’s tee, mapping out the soft skin of his back and drinking in the heat of Dean’s breath in his mouth. Grappling desperately with Dean’s belt buckle while he palms Cas through his pants, Cas drops his head to Dean’s shoulder and moans long and low against his collarbone.

Their clothes disappear in a flurry of inpatient hands and Cas doesn’t think about it when he pushes Dean onto the bed. He climbs on top of him, warmed where their chests brush together. Dean’s bare skin and the bite of his fingernails in Cas’s back, Cas arches against him and grinds down, bringing their cocks together. Seals his mouth over Dean’s when Dean lets out a loud groan. Remembers distantly that they need to be quiet.

“Shh,” Cas breathes against Dean’s throat where he’s planting wet kisses. Dean’s neck arcs back and he fists his hand in Cas’s hair, pulling hard. “Be quiet for me, honey. Can you do that for me?”

“Yeah,” Dean sighs, face pinched and mouth hanging open, panting heavily against the stillness of the room. “I’ll be quiet, Cas, I swear.”

“Good boy,” Cas says, pleased at the way Dean’s cock throbs against his. Cas reaches over, fumbling with the bedside dresser drawer, rooting around until he finds the lube.

Cas only realizes his hands are trembling when he tries and fails to uncap the lube. It takes far longer than it should to get it open and Cas sits up, leaning back on Dean’s lap, to slick the lube over his fingers. Dean watches him with hooded eyes, his pupils blown out and a flush spreading from his cheeks down to his chest. He’s so goddamned beautiful and Cas is so insatiable, he’ll never get enough of Dean. He could have this, every day until he died, and it still wouldn’t be enough. Cas’s want encompasses far more than the limits of time and space, and right now, it feels like it’s choking him.

“Please,” Dean says and he pushes himself up, into Cas’s arms, nosing against his face. He presses a kiss at the corner of Cas’s mouth.

Cas wraps Dean in his arms and pulls him into his lap, settling against the headboard. Dean loops his arms around the back of Cas’s neck, leans in close. Cas closes his eyes briefly, just breathes Dean in.

“Please,” Dean says again.

“It’s alright,” Cas says nonsensically, isn’t even thinking about the words coming out of his mouth, can’t think at all with the way Dean is pressed against him. “I’ve got you, my sweet boy. I’ll take care of you.”

Dean is shaking in his arms and Cas slits his eyes open, just enough to peer down to where Dean is leaking against him. His hard cock, flushed and curved up towards his belly, right next to Cas’s, is an intoxicating sight. And it gives him an idea.

Cas reaches down and wraps a large hand around them both. Dean lets out a hard breath against him and it fans across Cas’s face. Cas bites his lip, thighs tensing and stomach clenching. It’s so good, it’s so sweet, to feel Dean’s skin sliding against his. He builds his rhythm slowly, gently, his free arm wrapped around Dean’s waist so he can hold him close.

The bitten off moans Dean lets out are music to Cas’s ears and he can’t help the way he pants against Dean’s mouth, only having the presence to kiss Dean back some of the time. It’s messy and ragged where their lips meet and Cas licks into Dean’s mouth just to hear the moan Dean chokes back. He speeds his hand up gradually, heat spreading from his cock to his lower stomach all the way down to his toes.

Cas bites at Dean’s bottom lip and pulls it into his mouth, and Dean arches against him.

“Fuck,” Dean breathes out and his voice is just a whine. “‘S good, it’s so good, Cas, fuck.”

Dean trails his hands from Cas’s neck down to his chest, his fingernails scraping hard against his skin. When Dean’s pinky catches on Cas’s nipple, Cas buries his face into Dean’s neck and keens.

“You like that?” Dean pants into his hair. Cas feels him place a kiss against the crown of his head and his cock jumps in his hand.

“I like everything you do,” Cas says, leaning up to kiss Dean again. Dean’s tongue in his mouth and his hands on his chest, the frantic friction where their cocks are rubbing together, Cas can tell he’s getting close, and by the sounds of it, so is Dean.

“Shit,” Dean hisses against his mouth and Cas reaches up, tangling his hand in Dean’s hair, watches as Dean’s eyes fall shut. “God, I’m gonna fucking come if you keep doing that.”

“I want you to come,” Cas husks, scraping his fingernails against Dean’s scalp. He trails his fingers down the skin of Dean’s cheek, gentle now, and Dean turns his head, and in one swift moment, sucks Cas’s fingers into his mouth.

Cas comes, hard and unexpected, sweet heat blooming in his groin. His toes curl, his back arches, and he moans against the shock of his orgasm, feeling nothing but the head of Dean’s cock against his and his fingers, wet, in Dean’s mouth.

Cas only stops jerking them off when he can’t take it anymore, when the pleasure tips over into pain and oversensitization. He pants against the side of Dean’s face.

“Jesus Christ,” Dean groans against him. “You’re so fucking hot when you come. You know that?”

Cas doesn’t realize he’s squeezed his eyes shut until he opens them to find Dean gazing at him. His want is written all over his face and he’s still hard where Cas is gripping them both in his palm.

There’s come streaked against Dean’s stomach and the sight of it—of him marking Dean in this way—gives Cas all the incentive he needs. He lifts Dean effortlessly, out of his lap and presses him into the sheets, hovering over him now. Dean looks up at him, eyes hooded, a small smile pulling at his lips.

“Let me,” Cas pleads and he doesn’t even know what he’s asking for.

Still, Dean’s expression softens and he says, “Whatever you want, baby.”

Cas takes Dean into his mouth without hesitation. He tastes like lube and the salt of Cas’s come and Cas loves it. He closes his eyes, focuses on the heat of Dean’s cock and the taste of his precome. He can feel Dean grip tight against Cas’s hair, his thighs pressed against the sides of Cas’s face, digging into his shoulders. It’s bliss.

It’s easy to lose track of time like that; Cas’s reality narrows down to Dean’s panting moans and how tightly he’s clinging onto Cas. Cas tongues along the vein on the underside of Dean’s cock, sucks him down until the head hits the back of his throat. He could take Dean apart like this forever and never grow tired of it.

Cas can tell when Dean is close; his cock pulses against Cas’s tongue, he can taste where Dean is leaking into his mouth, and Dean is panting out a stream of extremities above him.

“Oh, fuck,” Dean breathes. “God, your fucking mouth, Cas—I’m gonna fucking come.”

Cas moves to grip the base of Dean’s cock, sucking him down with an intense focus he devotes little else to. He jerks Dean off where he doesn’t fit in his mouth and suckles the head of Dean’s cock until Dean is keening above him, his promise of staying quiet apparently forgotten.

It doesn’t matter, though, Cas doesn’t fucking care, because the next moment, Dean’s hands pull against Cas’s hair hard and he comes down his throat with a shout. Cas swallows against him, takes in every drop, never wants it to end. Soon Dean is shaking against him and Cas only stops when Dean tugs on his hair again, more urgently this time.

Cas is loath to pull away but he lets Dean fall from his mouth. Pushes himself up onto his elbows and opens his eyes.

Dean’s face is red up to the tips of his ears and he cups Cas’s face in his palm. Cas leans into it, overwhelmed.

“C’mere,” Dean rasps. Cas goes to him, into his arms, and Cas manages to get them situated beneath the covers well enough. Dean tucks his face into the curve of Cas’s neck the way he did before and Cas—Cas closes his eyes. Feels himself being lulled into sleep by the steady rise and fall of Dean’s chest where they’re pressed together.

It’s when Cas is right at the edge—when he’s almost lost to the world—that Dean’s gentle voice pulls him back.

“I’ll do it,” Dean whispers. Cas cracks his eyes open. Dean’s face is still pressed against him so he can’t make out Dean’s expression. Cas strokes a hand down Dean’s cheek and taps lightly on his arm. Dean gets the message, pulls back enough to look Cas in the eyes. His face is carefully neutral but his eyes are soft where they rest on Cas.

“Do what?” Cas says.

“What you said,” Dean says quietly. “It’ll—it’ll just be us. And I’m—I want it to just be us.”

All at once, Cas’s heart is pounding hard in his chest. His palms grow clammy and he can feel hope, the damned thing, begin to flower in the pit of his stomach.

“You—you mean…”

“Yeah,” Dean says even though Cas can’t bring himself to finish his sentence. “That’s what you want, right? Dates, kissing me goodnight, all that?”

“Yes,” Cas says softly. “I want that.”

“You can have it,” Dean says. “And me.”

Cas studies him carefully, the green of his eyes and his flushed face.

“I thought you wanted us to be casual,” he says carefully.

“I did,” Dean says plainly. “I thought we could be. But you—” Dean huffs a laugh but he’s smiling up at Cas. “You’re not what I expected,” he says. “I didn’t think I’d like you this damn much but—anyway. The point is, I’ll do it. I want it, you know, if you do.”

And Cas—

Cas doesn’t have the words, he knows. And he can never make Dean understand just how much he wants this, how much it means to him. But, Cas thinks, with Dean lying in his arms, gazing up at him, that doesn’t matter anymore. What matters is Cas is so in love he’s out of his mind and for once Dean is okay with that. For once he’s encouraging Cas’s affections.

It’s everything he’s ever wanted.

Cas reaches out, cups Dean’s face in his palm. Smiles down at him, not trying to hide how fond he is in that moment, how incandescently happy.

“Oh, Dean,” Cas whispers. “I always want you.”

Dean's soul flares against the borders of his skin, pleased. Cas watches as it pulses within him, reflecting Dean’s joy, his contentment.

Yes, he always wants Dean. And for once, that feels like triumph.

Cas is at peace.

Chapter Text

November passes by in a flurry of stolen kisses and secret dates, wildflowers picked from the field off the road to Bobby’s house, making each other coffee and sandwiches, and sitting next to each other on the couch during movie nights as close as they can get away with.

Cas has never considered himself particularly competitive, but something about Dean brings it out in him in the weeks that follow Dean agreeing to be exclusive.

In many ways, it’s only little things: seeing who can sneak the other the most mundane gifts, like flowers or chocolates, or opening the door for one another, or patching each other up after a hunt.

In other ways, it’s about so much more than that. Because when Dean picks a movie Cas mentioned to him for movie night, Cas realizes that Dean listens closely to what he says and cares about what he says, and he shows it through these small gestures. And when Cas wakes Dean up by combing his fingers through Dean’s hair every morning so he can sneak back into his own room before the others wake, Dean always gazes up at him with soft eyes, always so gentle when he’s half-asleep. And when Dean brushes his fingertips across the now-healing scar along Cas’s arm, Cas knows he’s falling deeper in love with Dean when he didn’t even think it was possible.

There’s so much of Cas’s life, especially within the last few decades, that has been out of his control: a meticulously constructed chaos that hurt him as much as healed him. But for once, the unpredictability of it—and the inevitability of it—feels like a blessing. Because Cas is falling in love and it’s beautiful, because Cas is falling in love and for the first time, that doesn’t feel like a punishment. It feels like an absolution.

And maybe Cas isn’t getting what he wants in the way he had thought it would come to him, but he’s long since learned the best things in life are the most unexpected ones, and Dean hit him like a runaway train from the very start. And he’s glad, he’s so glad, that it’s Dean. In every universe, in every timeline.

Looking into Dean’s eyes, in their bed, limbs tangled together beneath the sheets, Cas has made his way home at last. And for once, there’s nowhere he’d rather be.

The day after Halloween night, Cas isn’t sure what he expects. Dean spends the night in his room but leaves early the next morning for obvious reasons. Dean doesn’t want the others to know and Cas isn’t going to fight him on that. This is new, this is very new, and he doesn’t want to stretch the limits of Dean’s comfort when they don’t even know how this is going to work.

So when Cas sees him in the kitchen later that morning when they’re making breakfast with Sam, Ellen, Bobby, and Jo, he doesn’t think much of it. He doesn’t expect anything of Dean other than what Dean has offered to give him.

But Dean slides up next to him, bumps their shoulders together, and leans close to Cas to whisper, “Hey, meet me at the porch tonight after dark. Midnight.”

Cas raises a single eyebrow, intrigued.

“Oh?” Cas says quietly. “Why should I do that?”

Dean grins at him.

“I have a surprise for you.”

Dean goes to help Sam with the pancakes before Cas can ask for more information, but it gets him thinking. Dean shoots him another smile over his shoulder and Cas—is interested.

Later that night, when it feels like it takes entire days for it to reach midnight, Cas wraps himself in his favorite jacket and quietly tiptoes out to Bobby’s front porch. He finds Dean waiting there on the steps, a blanket in one hand and a six pack in the other.

“Dean,” Cas says, voice betraying his amusement. “What are you doing?”

“Well, you said you wanted romance,” Dean says, shrugging. “So I figured I may as well go all out. In for a penny, in for a pound, right?”

Now there’s a smile tugging at the corner of Cas’s mouth that he can’t hold back.

“What are those for?” Cas asks, nodding to the items in Dean’s hands. Dean holds them up, his grin softening at the edges.

“To stargaze,” Dean says easily. “It’s fuckin’ gorgeous here at night. C’mon.”

Cas follows Dean out into the junkyard, where Dean stops at an old pick-up truck. He lays the blanket out in the bed of the truck and they climb up together, laying back and turning their faces to the sky. Dean passes him a beer and Cas holds it absently in his hand.

He can’t focus on the beer, can’t even focus on the stars, because he turns his head to look at Dean, and Dean’s face is pure wonder. Freckles on his cheeks, the straight line of his nose, the pink of his mouth, he’s awe-inspiring in his effortless beauty. Cas is smitten and he’s content to spend the entire night watching Dean’s profile against the night sky.

Dean turns his head and meets Cas’s gaze. He doesn’t scold him for staring, doesn’t get angry. Cas can’t even bring himself to feel sorry for staring. He doesn’t know how he’s supposed to bring himself to look away, with Dean looking like that.

“Is it working?” Dean says softly.

“Is what working?” Cas says.

“The romance. I’m romancing you, Cas.”

“I can see that,” Cas whispers. “Yes, Dean, it's working.”

“Y’know, the whole point of this is to watch the stars.”

“Mhmm.”

“Can’t exactly do that if you’re starin’ at me the whole time.”

“I don’t mind,” Cas says. “I’d rather watch you.”

A flush spreads across Dean’s cheeks and the bridge of his nose. Something in Cas’s stomach flutters violently at the sight. A heady triumph—Dean is gorgeous when he’s flustered.

“You keep outdoing me without even trying.”

“I disagree,” Cas sighs. “But rest assured, I will start trying and I will outdo you.”

“Is that a challenge?” Dean says, lips upticking back into a grin.

“I’m afraid so,” Cas says. “You’ll get so sick of me, Dean. I’ll bring you flowers. I’ll tell you how beautiful you are for hours on end, if you let me. I’ll take you to bed every night and worship you the way you deserve.”

“Jesus, Cas,” Dean breathes. His eyes fall to half-mast and his soul pulses low but bright—pleased, aroused, excited. Happy.

“I don’t want to overwhelm you,” Cas says.

“Hit me with your best shot,” Dean says. “I can take it. I want to.”

And thus begins their competition to out-romance each other.

Three days after their stargazing date, Cas picks a bouquet of flowers for Dean and puts them in a mug on his nightstand, on Dean’s side of the bed. When they’re laying together, sweaty and sated beneath the sheets, he watches Dean turn his head and smile at them.

“I know you said flowers are cliche, but I couldn’t help myself,” Cas says.

“They are,” Dean says. “Damn. Guess I have to one-up you now, huh?”

Cas leans over and kisses the corner of Dean’s mouth. Dean smiles against him, raking a hand through his hair. He pulls Cas closer and kisses him in earnest. He takes like come and cigarette smoke and Cas loves it.

“I look forward to it,” Cas mutters against Dean’s lips.

A week later, Dean shakes him awake in the dead of night and convinces him to come to a 24-hour diner just ten minutes away.

“I don’t want to get out of bed,” Cas grouses.

“C’mon, Cas,” Dean whines. He trails a hand down Cas’s back, his touch featherlight. “Quit sabotaging me when I’m trying to seduce you.”

Cas squints at him through the dark.

“It is necessary to seduce me at—” He pauses, glancing over at the bedside clock. “Two-thirty in the morning?”

“Hell yes,” Dean says, unrepentant. “They’ve got great cheeseburgers there,” he adds. Cas considers him quietly before letting out a heaving sigh.

“Fine,” Cas grumbles and Dean beams. “But I’m only going for the cheeseburgers.”

At the diner, they split a milkshake and Dean laughs when Cas groans through the first bite of his burger. Dean was right, it’s delicious.

In mid-November, by sheer luck, Cas finds the perfect spot for a picnic. And while Dean may be leaning into the romance angle more for Cas’s sake than for his own, Cas can be just as romantic, and he intends to prove it.

Dean grumbles but still obeys when Cas requests he closes his eyes on the drive there. It’s not lost on Cas, that Dean is trusting him to drive Baby and not hurt her.

When Cas leads Dean out to the wildflower field off the highway where no one’s around—where the only sounds are that of bumblebees and the occasional bird—he pulls out the blanket and picnic basket he’d hidden in the trunk, and lays it all out.

“Alright,” Cas says finally. “You can open your eyes now.”

Dean huffs.

“It’s about damn ti—”

Dean cuts himself off, staring blankly at Cas. He looks down at the picnic basket, then to Cas, then back to the basket. Cas suppresses a grin.

“You bastard,” Dean says, gaping. “How the hell am I supposed to do better than this?”

“You can certainly try,” Cas says breezily. “But you’ll fail, Dean.”

They eat the strawberries Cas packed and drink lukewarm beer until the sun sets, casting a soft glow through the horizon. When Dean pulls Cas on top of him and kisses him breathless, Cas knows he’s won this round.

Less than a week before Thanksgiving, Dean sneaks into the bathroom with Cas, hand-in-hand. Cas isn’t sure what to expect at first—Dean had insisted he wait in his room until it was ready. Whatever it is, Cas has no idea.

He learns very quickly exactly what Dean was planning when he leads Cas into the bathroom. The old clawfoot tub that had previously been shoved in the corner, collecting dust, has been pulled to the center of the bathroom. It’s very clearly been cleaned, too, and it’s full to the lip with steaming water. Rose petals are scattered in the tub and there’s lit candles along the windowsill and the sink. At first, Cas can hardly believe his eyes.

“Did you put all this together?” Cas asks incredulously.

“You’re damn right,” Dean says and he sounds very smug. Cas narrows his eyes. “Oh, don’t look at me like that,” he scowls. “You started it with that goddamn picnic. No one out-does Dean Winchester.”

Dean crosses his arms, smirk firmly in place as he observes the bathroom with pride. Cas huffs.

“You better enjoy this,” Dean says. “This is without a doubt the gayest thing I’ve ever done. But there’s no way in hell you’re beating me at my own game, Cas. Not happening.”

Cas rolls his eyes but there’s a smile threatening to spread across his face, and he doesn’t want Dean to see.

“So,” Dean says, turning to him, eyebrows raised expectantly. “Are we doin’ this thing or not?”

The bath turns out to actually be very enjoyable. However, sex in a bathtub makes a bigger mess than either of them expected, and it takes two hours for them to clean the bathroom afterwards.

Still worth it.

Thanksgiving day arrives with a downpour of rain and excited chatter among the house. Dean had put a turkey in the oven early in the day so it would be ready for dinner that night. Everyone pitches in to help: mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, plenty of beer, and, of course, apple pie.

They dance around each other in the kitchen with an effortlessness that should surprise Cas but doesn’t. It doesn’t occur to Cas that he may not be welcome at this dinner until far too late in the day to actually ask. When he’s side-by-side with Dean at the counter, who’s fussing over threading the top crust of the apple pie, Cas realizes that—this isn’t really his family. At least, not in the way they’re all family to each other. Cas has been the outsider since day one. And while he’s been with them for months now, he never thought to check with Bobby or Ellen beforehand if it was okay for him to be here.

“Hey,” Dean brushes his hand briefly along Cas’s shoulder. “You okay?”

Cas glances around the kitchen—Bobby and Ellen are setting the table, while Jo is working on the casserole and Sam is checking the internal temperature of the turkey. The coast seems clear but Cas still clears his throat and pitches his voice low.

“I’m alright,” Cas murmurs. “I just—I realized I never checked if it was okay for me to spend Thanksgiving here with all of you.”

Dean frowns, crossing his arms and leaning back against the counter.

“Why wouldn’t you?” Dean says. “I mean—do you not want to?”

“What? No,” Cas chuckles. “Dean, of course I want to. I just don’t want to intrude.”

“You’re not intruding, Cas,” Dean says immediately and he sounds upset. “We want you here. I want you here. Okay?”

Cas holds Dean gaze nervously. He’s being earnest, Cas can tell—he knows Dean too well by now—but he still wonders if maybe he should have talked to Bobby about it first. Perhaps he’s grown too comfortable.

“Don’t worry about it. Seriously,” Dean whispers. “Look, no one even brought it up to me. We just assumed you’d stay for Thanksgiving.”

Something tight in Cas’s chest loosens at that. Because if Dean’s telling the truth, then he’s not the only one who never thought to bring it up. Maybe he’s been here long enough—maybe he’s proven himself enough—that he doesn’t need to ask. Not anymore.

It’s a nice thought, a comforting one. To belong to a place enough that your presence is assumed rather than a privilege to be granted.

Cas hopes that never changes, now that he has it.

By seven in the evening, the table is set and food is spread out like a banquet. It’s nothing fancy—they’re all drinking whatever beer was leftover in the fridge and Bobby doesn’t have the cutlery to properly carve the turkey—but they’re all together and Ellen put on the radio in the living room, and the general air is one of camaraderie. Cas wouldn’t have it any other way.

And while Cas is so grateful to be here, he doesn’t want to take away from the others enjoying the company of their family, so he figures he’ll keep quiet and only speak when spoken to. He doesn’t want to draw too much attention to himself, he doesn’t want to intrude. And despite Dean’s assurances, he thinks it’ll be better this way.

As it turns out, they don’t let him.

Not long after sitting down with everyone to eat, when they’ve all piled their plates with food, Bobby speaks up.

“Alright, everyone, you know the drill,” Bobby says gruffly. “Someone’s gotta give a speech and it ain’t gonna be me. So, any takers?”

“I’m only here for the food,” Jo says airily. Ellen sighs next to her.

“Not the speech-making type,” Ellen says, shrugging.

“I’ve never made a speech in my life,” Dean deadpans. “I’m not about to start now.”

“Uh,” Sam says and he looks around the table at everyone, eyes wide. Cas gets the impression he’s doing some quick thinking. “Pass?”

Cas realizes after a moment that everyone’s looking at him. Cas raises his eyebrows, surprised.

“Me?” Cas says slowly.

“Well, it ain’t gonna be any of us,” Bobby says lightly.

“I’m—” Cas gapes momentarily, caught off guard. A speech, he can do a speech. How hard can it be? “What kind of speech?”

“Y’know, the festive kind or whatever,” Dean says.

“Why don’t you start with what you’re thankful for,” Sam suggests.

Cas thinks for a moment, chewing absently on his lip. It’s while he’s contemplating how he should start—he could reference the first time they met, maybe quote Dostoevsky, but perhaps that would be too facetious—when he feels Dean’s knee knock against his beneath the table. Cas looks over at him and—he’s smiling this gentle, soft smile, and something in Cas settles.

“Well,” Cas says. “I suppose I can’t acknowledge what I’ve gained now without paying tribute to what I had to lose to get it.”

Cas pauses, feels a pesky stinging behind his eyes and his face grows hot but—but. This matters.

“I think it goes without saying—I’m sure you know by now but—I was alone. When you all found me, I was—I was alone.” Cas swallows thickly. He stares down at his hands, not courageous enough to meet any of their eyes.

“I know that I’m not the easiest person to get to know. Even still—you offered me your home, your food, your company. Your trust. I know that it’s a gift. I have no intention of disrespecting what you’ve given me. Because I came to you with nothing but now—I’m trying to live for what's in front of me, rather than what I’ve had to leave behind. To—to move forward.”

Cas risks a glance up, sees the look on Bobby’s face. Thinks of their conversation that very first night in the car.

For a moment, just a moment, Cas lets himself think of his family—his real family. He doesn’t dare let his mind wander there these days, not with how focused he’s been on building something new, but now—what he had then, it matters, too.

He thinks of long drives in the Impala, Dean behind the wheel and Sam in the passenger seat—the familiarity of it, and the ease of it, and the comfort of it. The smell of the leather seats and the feeling of Dean’s hand on his shoulder. Jack’s bright smile and quiet sincerity. All they lost, all they created, the life they shaped for themselves in the face of a cruel God; writing their own story. Making it up as they go.

Cas doesn’t know how God figures into this timeline and he doesn’t want to. He doesn’t even fully understand how God figured into his, but he knows this: what he made, with Sam and Dean and Jack, it was his own. It was his. And despite all of Chuck’s claims, despite his prewritten destiny as an angel, despite the nature of fate and how he’s helpless to stop it or change it—his family was born of something much greater than fate: choice.

He chose the Winchesters and it fucking matters. Now, here he is, fourteen years too early, choosing them again.

“I had a family,” Cas says quietly. “I had a family of my own once and I—I’d like to think that if they were still here—if they could see where I am now—I think that they’d be glad.” Tears fall unbidden down his cheeks but he can’t stop, won’t stop, until he says what he needs to say. “And I think they’d be grateful for the kindness you all have shown me. Because they—they wouldn’t want me to be alone. They’d want me to find a home again and I—I don’t think I would have allowed myself to have one unless someone was giving it to me.”

Cas looks at each of them in turn, his cheeks flushed but determined to make his point regardless.

“I suppose I’ve never been one for allowing myself to have good things,” Cas says. “At least, not without some measure of guilt. But I—I’m glad I’m here. And I’m happy. I never—I didn’t really have that, before.”

And Cas knows that it goes so much deeper than what he can ever tell these people—he can never explain how he didn’t get the one thing he wanted in his own world, how it was the one thing out of his reach that could grant him true happiness, but that doesn’t matter, because the point remains the same. He has what he wants here. And maybe he won’t get back what he lost, but he thinks he doesn’t need to.

“I’d like to stay,” Cas says, voice wavering. “If you’ll have me, I would like to stay here with all of you.”

“Cas,” Bobby says gently. “Y’don’t gotta ask. You can stay as long as you like.”

Cas only nods, not trusting himself to not burst into tears. Ellen reaches over and gives his shoulder a squeeze. Beneath the table, Dean’s leg is pressed against his.

Yes, he’s going to stay. He’s going to stay.

Later, after they’ve eaten and watched a few movies, piled together on the couch, Cas retires to his room early. They were halfway through a Star Wars marathon—Dean’s idea—when Cas excused himself. This day has been a total rollercoaster and frankly, he’s exhausted. And despite what he said at the dinner table—despite his intention to stay—it’s not that simple. And now that Cas has started thinking about it, he can’t bring himself to stop.

Because—what would they think, if they could see him now? What would Dean think? What would Jack? If they’re out there, if they survived Chuck and are going on with their lives, would they truly be happy for him?

Cas knows, on some level, that Dean wanted him to be happy. His Dean. Regardless of the fights they got into, the betrayals, the back-and-forth and constant stress of trying to keep the world safe, his Dean cared about him. Not in the way Cas wanted, but still. He was Dean’s best friend and he knows that’s not a title he gave out lightly. Cas earned it.

Cas thinks his Dean would want Cas to come back to him. But Cas doesn’t have that choice. If his only option is to stay—if the only way their story can end is on separate pages—then he thinks his Dean wouldn’t want him to be alone. The same way he hopes his Dean isn’t alone.

As for Jack—well, that’s easy. Of course it is. Because even though so many things with Jack were hard, it was so, so easy to love him, it was so, so easy to be his father. Cas had prayed to Jack in a way he only ever prayed to Chuck—that same devotion, the same faith he thought he lost long ago. Pure faith, not based on evidence, going against what the whole world was telling him, even Dean—believing that Jack was good, believing he would change things for the better. Believing that loving Jack was the right choice, regardless of the consequences it would invoke.

And despite what would come later, Cas knows he was right. He was right about Jack. And Jack had loved him with a single-mindedness that typically only angels are capable of. But Jack was so much more than an angel and he was so much more than what Cas thought he would be.

Cas thinks that if there’s anyone out there who’s capable of forgiving Cas of his wrongdoings—of absolving him of his mistakes, his regrets—it’s Jack. All Jack wanted was for Cas to be happy, and Cas has always known that. He hopes that, wherever Jack is now, he knows that he’s never regretting making the deal with the Empty. Having the time he had with Jack was worth damnation ten times over.

But—he didn’t get closure with Jack, like he did with Dean. He got to say goodbye to his Dean—to lay his cards on the table. To put it to rest. He said what he needed to say and it made him happier than he had been in his entire life.

He didn’t get that with Jack. He didn’t get to say goodbye. And there’s no other version of Jack in this universe, no way for Cas to reconcile with him now. In so many ways, his time with Jack feels—incomplete. Cut short.

He just misses him so much.

When Cas begins to weep, he doesn’t try to fight it. He’s grateful to be here, he is. That doesn’t make missing his family any easier.

A knock at his bedroom door has Cas freezing in his spot. His whole body locks up and he feels unreasonably embarrassed all of a sudden, that he’s hiding in his room and crying while the others are out spending time together.

“Cas?” Dean calls through the door. Cas hesitates—he’s a goddamn mess right now. And he thinks if he talks to Dean, he’ll say something stupid. And yet—

“Come in,” Cas calls out before he can think better of it.

This isn’t something Cas can avoid and it’s not something he can hide, either. While he can never reveal to Dean the full extent of what he’s mourning, he thinks he needs to give Dean at least some insight into what’s going on in his head. Especially now that they’re together.

Dean cracks open the door, leaning against the doorframe with an easy smile, until he sees Cas. His posture changes instantly—the open, flirtatious stance is replaced very quickly with concern, and he closes the door shut behind him and sits next to Cas on the bed. Dean reaches out, running gentle fingers along Cas’s face. Cas leans into it, helpless to resist.

“What’s wrong?” Dean says, voice hushed. “Did something happen? Are you okay?”

For a moment, Cas just looks at him. The slight furrow between his brow, the green of his eyes, the quiet beauty of his soul on the ethereal plane. Dean is so goddamned beautiful, he deserves so much more than Cas can give him, but still he’s here with Cas—he’s choosing to be with Cas.

It’s as Cas is realizing this that he makes his decision.

“I miss Jack,” Cas rasps. Tears run steadily down his cheeks and his throat is constricting as he tries to hold back sobs.

“Okay,” Dean says quietly, rubbing his thumb against Cas’s cheek. “Who’s Jack?”

“My son,” Cas says. “Jack is—Jack was my son.”

Dean freezes against him. Eyes wide, stock-still, Cas thinks he’s never seen Dean so caught off guard before. He’s never let on to Dean that he was a father once, and that was intentional. The same way this is.

“You—” But Dean doesn’t finish his sentence.

“I wanted to tell you,” Cas says. “But Dean, I—I didn’t know how. It’s hard for me to talk about him. But I miss him and I—I miss being a father.”

Dean seems to come back to himself slowly. There’s a guarded look on Dean’s face, one that seems very carefully and purposefully neutral.

“What happened?” Dean says. Cas only shakes his head.

“I couldn’t save him,” Cas says, because it’s true, and because Cas doesn’t even know how Jack died. He just knows he’s gone. “It was my fault and I couldn’t save him.”

Cas wipes his face almost angrily, somewhere between embarrassed and hurt. He doesn’t know how Dean’s perception of him is going to change after this and that terrifies him.

“You never told me you’re a dad,” Dean says softly.

“I’m not,” Cas says, voice hollow. “Not anymore.”

Then, Dean just looks at him. But he strokes against Cas’s cheek gently with one hand and the other rubs soothing circles into Cas’s back. Cas gives into his impulses and leans his head against Dean’s shoulder. He lets his eyes fall shut and just focuses on where Dean’s touching him, the hand that’s now raking gently through his hair. It’s soft and it’s sweet and it’s Dean.

Suddenly Cas is surrounded by warmth on all sides; Dean is hugging him and Cas nuzzles against the skin of his throat, can feel his heartbeat where their chests are pressed together. Dean holds him and Cas is anchored by his warmth.

“It’s okay,” Dean whispers and Cas feels him press a kiss against his hairline. “I’ve got you. You’re okay, Cas.”

Cas cries in Dean’s arms until sleep takes him, swift and sure.

Cas wakes an indeterminable amount of time later. He’s still wrapped in Dean’s arms and their legs are tangled together beneath the bed sheets. Cas doesn’t remember getting under the covers. Dean must’ve pulled it over both of them after he fell asleep.

“Dean,” Cas whispers. He glances over at the bedside clock—it’s nearly four a.m. He’s surprised he slept through most of the night. It seems his exhaustion got the better of him.

Cas reaches up and cradles Dean’s face gently, oh so gently. Dean’s eyelashes flutter once, twice, before he opens his eyes.

“Hi,” Cas says softly. Dean turns to him, his expression open in a way it hasn’t been since before last night.

“Hey,” Dean says.

“Thank you,” Cas says. “For last night. I was—I was a mess. You made me feel better. So thank you.”

Dean just turns so he’s slotted against Cas’s side. He rests his head on the pillow Cas is laying on. This close, even through the dark, Cas can make out his individual freckles.

“Thanks for telling me,” Dean says. “I know it wasn’t easy.”

“It wasn’t,” Cas says. “But it was—easier, with you. It’s always easier with you.”

Dean leans forward to kiss him, cloaked under the quiet of the early morning, and Cas knows that he made the right decision.

December comes with the first snow flurries of the year and heavy cloud coverage. The temperature is biting, especially late at night, and Cas finds himself having to wear multiple layers to stay warm, even in the house. Bobby’s heat goes on and off, and though he tinkers with it, laid out with a box of tools, it never seems to get any closer to being fixed.

It’s not so bad, though. There’s almost always a fire in the fireplace in the living room, and that helps to warm the place up.

With December comes excitement for Christmas. Cas genuinely hadn’t known what to expect—whether his friends would try to celebrate or let the holiday pass unacknowledged—but he wakes one morning to find a small pine tree propped up in the corner of the living room, with Jo and Sam hanging silver bulbs and red garland on it.

As the weeks pass and the holiday creeps nearer, a small pile of presents begins to grow beneath the tree. Cas realizes very quickly he needs to figure out what he’s going to get everyone. He keeps a running list hidden in his underwear drawer, where even Dean won’t think to check, of present ideas for his friends. And for Dean, of course.

Bobby’s house slowly but surely begins to accumulate different decorations, the most prominent being the stockings nailed above the fireplace. When Cas sees one with his own name on it next to Dean’s, he nearly weeps from the sheer joy of it. To have found another home after losing everything is something he didn’t think he’d have and could never hope to deserve.

“Sam and Dean made it,” Bobby says. Cas jumps, cheeks flushing at being caught staring. Maybe it’s stupid—it’s just a stocking, after all—but it still matters to him.

“I appreciate it,” Cas says earnestly. “It’s—it’s been a long time since I’ve had one of my own.”

Cas thinks back on the Christmases he spent with the Winchesters in his own time. They were always rushed, never quite able to just relax and enjoy the holiday. There was always someone to save, a catastrophe to prevent, more work to be done. Cas thinks this might be the first holiday he’s spent that he’ll actually be able to enjoy.

For a moment, he and Bobby just stand together in silence, admiring the stockings on the fireplace.

“You’ve done a wonderful job with them,” Cas finds himself saying. Bobby raises an eyebrow, crossing his arms. Somewhere between defensive and intrigued, and Cas can’t help but smile.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Bobby says finally.

“With Sam and Dean, I mean,” Cas says, unrepentant. This is something he isn’t going to let go, and it’s something he thinks Bobby deserves to hear.

Bobby scoffs but there’s no real heat behind it and Cas thinks he looks more pleased than anything.

Still, Bobby says, “I ain’t their father.”

“You aren’t,” Cas says quietly. “Yet you took them in anyway. I’m not blind, Bobby. From father to father—you did well. You should be proud,” he adds.

Bobby won’t look at him now but Cas hears him sniffle. Distantly, Cas wonders if anyone’s ever said something like this to him before.

“Yeah, well,” Bobby says, shrugging. “Someone had to look after those idjits. They’re always gettin’ into some kinda trouble.”

“Hmm,” Cas hums. “I wonder where they learned that from.”

“Hey, they don’t get to put that on me,” Bobby says and Cas bites back a smile. “I swear, those two’re gonna make me go gray.”

“I’m afraid to say you’re already gray, Bobby,” Cas says lightly. “But then, so am I. So I can’t really judge.”

“Pssh,” Bobby scoffs. “Aging’s overrated, anyhow.”

“Aging is a gift we’ve both been blessed with,” Cas says. “And it’s one I hope we all get to enjoy for many more years to come.”

Bobby eyes him suspiciously, eyes narrowed.

“What’s got you all sentimental?”

“I like the holidays,” Cas says gently. “It reminds me of my family.”

Bobby seems to consider this and he nods.

“Yeah, I get that,” Bobby says, then hesitates. “Me too.”

Cas thinks quietly for a moment, weighing his options. He trusts Bobby and he thinks Bobby trusts him. In the end, he decides to take the risk.

“You told me once, that the truest way to honor those I’ve lost is to move forward,” Cas says slowly. “At the time, I didn’t know how I was going to do that. Frankly, I’m not sure I even wanted to but…I am, now.”

Cas turns to face Bobby fully because this is important and he needs Bobby to hear him.

“It took me a long time,” Cas says in a hushed voice, feeling like he’s confessing some terrible sin. “Before, I was hardly living. I let my grief consume me. Going through the motions. Running on empty. And then—you found me. All of you. And suddenly, I—I started to feel again. And I began to hope.” Cas swallows thickly, blinking back tears. “And I need you to know how grateful I am. Before, hope was the only thing keeping me alive. Now it keeps me comfortable because I—I don’t need it anymore. I don’t need to hope for things to get better, because they already are. For once, I want for nothing because I finally have everything I need.”

Cas wipes a hand across his face, feeling a little embarrassed to be crying in front of Bobby, but saying it matters more to him than his dignity does.

“You were right. I won’t get my family back and I’ll miss them every day of my life. But I have something new, now. And it’s—it’s good. And I’m glad. I didn’t think I’d get to have something good again.”

“The good things in life are usually unexpected,” Bobby says lightly. “Not everyone gets a second chance. I’m glad you got yours.”

Cas smiles. He’s glad, too.

Late one night in mid-December, when Cas is laying in bed reading, there’s a soft knock at his door. Cas smiles automatically—he knows it’s Dean, because it’s always Dean. He spends more nights with Cas than he does in his own bed, always waiting until Sam falls asleep so as not to raise suspicion.

“Come in,” Cas calls out, marking his page and setting his book on his bedside dresser. The door opens and Dean steps through, shutting the door gently behind him. One of his hands is behind his back and the other is rubbing at the back of his neck in a nervous gesture Cas hasn’t seen in a while.

“Is everything alright?” Cas asks.

“Yeah,” Dean says with a shrug. “You got a minute?”

“For you, always,” Cas says softly. He pats the space next to him and Dean takes it. His features seem somehow gentler in the low glow of his bedside lamp and Cas lets himself just admire Dean’s beauty.

“So, I know Christmas isn’t for another two weeks,” Dean says. “But I wanted to give it to you now.”

Dean reveals what he was holding behind his back—a small box, wrapped crudely in newspaper. For a moment, Cas just stares, surprised.

“This is—for me?” Cas asks, unsure.

“Yeah,” Dean says. There’s a flush stained across his cheeks and the bridge of his nose and—he’s nervous, Cas realizes.

Cas takes the box and begins to carefully remove the newspaper. He can feel Dean’s eyes trained on him the entire time. When the newspaper is gone, he’s left with a simple cardboard box. Cas hesitates.

“Go on,” Dean says, nudging him. “Open it.”

So Cas does, lifting the top flap. It’s a mug, he realizes. Curious, Cas reaches inside to pull it out of the box and hold it up to the light. It’s a plain white mug with some kind of writing on the side. Cas turns it again to get a better look and—

Cas stops. His hands clench around the mug and his vision blurs with tears. The air in the room suddenly feels too thin and his chest feels too tight, and he couldn’t stop himself from crying even if he wanted to.

“Just because your son is gone,” Dean says quietly. “Doesn’t mean you’re not still a dad.”

Cas clamps a hand over his mouth to stifle his sobs and Dean reaches out, gently brushing his hair away from his forehead.

“Y’know, I don’t know much about kids,” Dean says. “But I know a good father when I see one. Remember how you told me I could miss my dad in whatever way I need to miss him? Well, you can miss your son in whatever way you need to miss him. But the important thing is, he’s still your son, Cas. And I know how much you love him, ‘cause I can hear it in your voice when you talk about him.”

Cas clutches the mug close to his chest and he can see where his tears have fallen onto the World’s #1 Dad inscription. It’s like there’s a yawning void in the pit of his stomach and there’s grief and longing and joy and love and anguish all pouring out of it at once, to the point where he can’t tell them apart.

Cas looks into Dean’s eyes and there’s no judgment there, there’s no uncertainty. Dean’s looking right at him and Cas loves him, he loves him, and it’s consuming him.

When Cas leans forward to kiss Dean through his tears, it’s only to shut himself up because he can feel the words on the tip of his tongue. He wants to say it. He wants Dean to know.

Because the thing is—he does. And he’s always loved Dean, he’d love any version of Dean, but what matters is he loves his Dean and he loves this Dean. Because they’re not the same person—maybe they were once, but that was long before Cas met him, and this is a version of Dean Cas has never known. And he’s different, they couldn’t be more different if they tried, but Cas loves him, too. And that distinction matters to him.

“You told me once that loving my dad says more about me than the fact that I couldn’t save him,” Dean says. “You were right. And you loving your kid says a hell of a lot more about you than you not being able to save him.”

Cas falls into Dean’s arms and Dean holds him like he’s used to it, like Cas belongs here. Cas sets the mug down on the dresser so he can wrap his arms around Dean and hold him tight, tight, tighter. He wants to feel Dean’s every inhale and exhale. He never wants to let go.

“Dean,” Cas breathes. He leans back only far enough to rest their foreheads together and he takes Dean’s face in his hands. He can feel Dean’s eyelashes flutter against the skin beneath his eyes. Dean’s breath fans warm on his face and Cas strokes along the contour of his cheekbones.

“I adore you,” Cas whispers. This close, he can feel how Dean’s breath hitches. Dean’s fingers dig into Cas’s back and he doesn’t care, he doesn’t care, because Dean needs to know. “You make me so happy. You make me feel seen.”

In the quiet of the room, he can hear how Dean swallows heavily. The anticipation, the expectation, the hope, Cas can feel it in every wall in the room, in the very air they’re sharing. And he thinks if he says it now, Dean will be happy. He thinks it’s something Dean wants to hear and it’s pure, incandescent joy to realize that.

“Dean,” Cas breathes. “Can I—can I say it?”

“Please,” Dean whispers.

Cas waits, savors the sweet tension, every point of contact where they’re touching feeling like fire, like possibility, like inevitability. Like fate.

And maybe Cas is a fool, maybe he’s selfish, maybe every bad thing that’s ever happened to him he’s brought upon himself, but Cas made this, too. His love for Dean is his and he brought that upon himself, too.

There’s no dread, no death on the other side of the door, no tragedy waiting to happen. Here, Cas loves Dean and for once it isn’t going to bring him doom. For once, it only fosters possibility.

“I love you,” Cas says. “Dean, I love—”

Dean’s kissing him hard, teeth biting down on Cas’s lower lip, his hands frantic where they’re running along Cas’s back, and Cas melts into it. Feels all the tension in his body seep out abruptly and all that’s left is want.

“Tell me again,” Dean breathes. He’s panting against Cas’s mouth and Cas chases the taste, running his tongue along his lip. He watches Dean track the movement, eyes half-lidded and pupils blown out.

“I love you,” Cas says, feels like he’s going out of his goddamn mind, feels like he’s in a dream. “I can’t help it, Dean, I love you.”

Dean’s face crumples and Cas presses a kiss to his cheek, his forehead, the corner of his eye. Holds Dean close and realizes he’s trembling against him.

“Dean?” Cas says tentatively. “Is it—is that okay?”

Tears run tracks down Dean’s face but his soul is radiant, flaring against the borders of his skin. Cas feels his grace’s longing, the desire to reach out, to enjoin, to become one.

“No one’s ever loved me before,” Dean whispers and—oh. Oh.

“Oh, Dean,” Cas murmurs. “My sweet boy. You don’t know, do you?”

Dean buries his face in the crook of Cas’s neck and Cas rakes his fingers through Dean’s hair. His other arm settles firmly around Dean’s back.

“I’ll tell you every day,” Cas says. “If you let me. I’ll tell you until you grow tired of hearing it.”

“I’ll never get tired of hearing that,” Dean mutters against his throat.

Cas brings his lips to the crown of Dean’s head, letting his eyes fall shut.

“I’ll never get tired of saying it,” Cas whispers.

Cas drags his arm up from Dean’s back, encircles around his neck, and lays his hand on Dean’s right shoulder. His handprint isn’t there, not on this Dean, and Cas has the insane urge to mark him with it. It’s possessive, it’s territorial, but he loves Dean. He misses his grace running through Dean’s veins. He misses being a part of Dean.

“You don’t know what you’ve done to me,” Cas murmurs. “I want things I shouldn’t want.”

“Like what?” Dean whispers. He shifts against Cas, brings their foreheads together again, their lips tantalizingly close. “Tell me.”

“I’m afraid I’ll scare you away,” Cas admits. The things he thinks—they would be too much. There’s so much Dean doesn’t know about him and he can’t bear to lose Dean now, when he finally has him.

“You won’t,” Dean says but—he doesn’t know. He doesn’t. “I wanna hear it,” Dean adds. “Please, Cas. Tell me.”

Cas swallows thickly. Considers each possible outcome—he could scare Dean, he could repulse him. Dean could pull away and not come back and—it would kill him, probably. Losing Dean the first time should’ve. If he loses him again, surely it’ll finish the job.

But maybe Dean’s right. And maybe—maybe Dean wants the same things.

So Cas takes a deep breath, steadies himself. Lets it all spill out, every sugar-sweet word he’s kept trapped inside for the last twelve years, every bit of affection he was too ashamed of and too afraid to ever say aloud.

“You have no idea,” Cas says quietly. “What it means for me, to love you. You couldn’t possibly understand—what it cost me. I wasn’t always like this, Dean. Under my father’s thrall, I didn’t love. I didn’t want. I didn’t feel.” Cas lets out a shaky breath. “My father told me I was made wrong and I let myself believe it. He got into my head and I’ve spent the rest of my life trying to recover from it.”

Cas grips tight against Dean’s shoulder, and his hand fits perfectly, like it belongs there, like it was made to hold Dean.

“But this isn’t sin,” Cas whispers. “I know that now. Loving you isn’t sinful. It’s exaltation. I thought once the rapture could only come from blood and bone. But I found enlightenment from tender flesh. Everything I was taught—you’ve disproven. And I—I know I wasn’t made wrong because I love you. I wasn’t made wrong—because I love you. Do you understand, Dean?”

Dean’s face has gone slack where it’s resting against Cas’s, and his eyes are cloudy and unfocused.

“I do,” Dean whispers back. “I get it.”

Fresh tears run down Dean’s face. Cas trails his fingers from Dean’s hair to dry his face with reverent strokes across his skin.

“I thought that, too,” Dean admits, voice trembling. “I used to think something was wrong with me. But this—it doesn’t feel wrong. It feels—it feels—”

Dean shakes his head slightly and Cas moves with him, lets Dean’s movements guide him.

“It feels natural,” Cas supplies. “It’s so natural for me to love you, Dean.”

“I know,” Dean rasps and Cas’s heart stutters in his chest. “I know it is. ‘Cause it’s the same for me, Cas. It’s the same for me.”

Cas closes his eyes and he can see through his shut eyelids the lamp on his dresser flickering. He breathes in deep through his nose, lets it out through his mouth. Takes a moment to get himself under control. He thinks if he hears those words from Dean, he might just blow out every light from here to the East Coast. Still, his heart is thrumming heavily in his chest and his palms are clammy with anticipation.

“It is?” Cas whispers. Feels like his hope is choking him, is cradling him, is killing him.

“Yeah,” Dean whispers back. Then, so quiet it’s almost inaudible, “I love you, too, y’know.”

All of Cas’s breath leaves him in a harsh exhale. He chokes on nothing, tears burning hot across his eyes and nose, hands clenching against Dean’s skin. His grace pulses, flares, reeling against the borders of his skin. In the ethereal plane, his wings tremble in a way they never have before.

Containing the sheer force of his joy is one of the hardest things Cas has ever done.

Cas can’t stop the tears, they run freely down his face, and he feels Dean clutch him tighter.

The space between them feels sacred, feels biblical, feels like fate, and every part of Cas comes alive at once. This is the rapture foretold in the holy times; this is fulfilling a destiny of his own choosing. Cas will never want for heaven after this. His paradise is right here.

“No one’s ever loved me before, either,” Cas chokes out. “I’m so glad it’s you, Dean. I’m—I’m so glad it’s you.”

In the quiet of the night, curled against Dean, feeling the way Dean’s soul is reaching out for his grace, even unknowingly—Cas is home.

Chapter Text

On Christmas Eve, everything changes. It’s entirely predictable and entirely Dean and Cas’s fault, but it still takes Cas by surprise when it happens.

It starts innocently enough. When the others go to the grocery store for some last-minute supplies for their dinner tomorrow, Dean and Cas are delegated to baking cookies. It’s Jo’s idea: she argues homemade are better than the store-bought ones and Cas thinks it will be fun to brush up on his (mediocre) baking skills, so he volunteers. Dean joins him all too gladly.

It’s Dean’s fault, really. He’s the one who starts it. Cas had been minding his own business, kneading the dough and carefully sprinkling flour over it, when something powdery hits the side of his face.

Cas blinks for a moment, stunned, before slowly turning to Dean. Cas can feel the flour sticking to his face and—goddamn it, he’s pretty sure it’s in his hair, too. Dean is spectacularly failing at holding back a smile, and there’s a bright flush across his cheeks and the bridge of his nose. And Cas wants to be mad but Dean looks so beautiful when he’s happy.

Still, this can’t go unpunished.

“Dean,” Cas says, voice remarkably even for how much effort it takes to not burst into laughter. “Did you just throw flour at me?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Dean says. Cas glances down and his hands are both completely white from the flour.

“Really?” Cas drawls. He nods pointedly at Dean’s hands and Dean shrugs.

“This means nothing,” Dean deadpans.

“I hate you,” Cas says but he’s smiling now. Dean mirrors it, face breaking into a grin.

“No, you don’t,” Dean says confidently. “You love me. I’m adorable.”

“You’re a menace,” Cas says and Dean smirks.

“I’m hilarious,” Dean says and Cas doesn’t hesitate; Dean’s barely finished speaking when Cas takes a handful of flour and throws it directly in Dean’s face. It’s a lot more than he thought it would be, completely coating his features. Dean blinks and his eyes stand out against the stark white. Cas has a moment of clarity that this probably won’t end well before Dean is on him, hands grasping wildly for more flour and trying to touch every bit of Cas he can reach. Cas goes mostly on the offensive, unable to do much more through his shaking laughter, and he’s so in love it’s ridiculous.

In the end, Cas is still taller than Dean, and he’s stronger, too, so it’s all too easy to press Dean up against the counter and pin his hands down. Dean struggles futilely but it’s mostly for show, Cas can tell. Dean huffs and shakes his head like a dog shakes its pelt, and some of the flour comes flying off his face and lands directly on Cas’s shirt.

“You bastard,” Dean says but he’s laughing, too, face split into a grin so wide it looks painful. “You’re a terrible boyfriend. I’m breaking up with you. We’re broken up.”

Cas shakes his head, gazing at Dean fondly, and he knows his feelings are written all over his face—covered in flour though it may be.

“Don’t start what you can’t finish,” Cas says. “You should know better than to underestimate me, Dean. And you’re not breaking up with me, I’m breaking up with you.”

“What?” Dean gapes, all faux-offense. “Hey, what’d I do?”

“You threw flour on my face,” Cas says seriously. “That’s a breaking-up worthy offense. You brought this on yourself, Dean.”

“No, no, I broke up with you first. I win.”

“I resent that. I’m the one dumping you. You’re too late, Dean, it’s decided.”

“No, you’re wrong—”

“I’m not—”

“You’re so wrong, it’s crazy—”

“Dean, you should know by now I’m never wrong.”

“You’re a jackass.”

Cas pauses, considering this.

“That’s fair,” Cas concedes. “But you’re the one foolish enough to date me, so which of us is really the dumb one?”

Dean doesn’t respond, just looks Cas dead in the eye as he wrangles one of his hands free from Cas’s grasp—really, Cas lets it go—and drags it down Cas’s shirt. His black shirt, which is now utterly stained with flour.

Cas lunges before he can break, because he can’t hold back his smile any longer, and he wrestles with Dean against the counter, their laughter ringing out in the kitchen freely. He’s so happy, he’s so goddamn happy, and he can’t remember ever feeling like this before.

He never really got to experience that much of this—the good parts of being in love. There was always so much pain.

But nothing about this is painful.

Cas presses Dean against the fridge and Dean is panting against him, but he’s smiling, too, and Cas kisses him without a thought. Their lips sliding together, slow and sweet, unhurried in the early afternoon. Dean tastes powdery from the flour and Cas licks into his mouth, seeking out Dean’s taste, finds syrup from the pancakes they had for breakfast. Dean’s hands fist at the back of his shirt and Cas tangles his fingers in Dean’s hair. It’s all too easy, too natural, to slide his knee between Dean’s legs and Dean groans, pulling him closer.

And Dean is moaning into his mouth and his hand is fumbling with Cas’s zipper—it’s quick and messy and so fucking hot, and Cas loves it, he loves being able to touch Dean, to kiss him, to love him, and—

“Jesus Christ!”

Cas wrenches himself away from Dean and turns to look over his shoulder and—

Dread, heavy like a lead weight, thick like poison, seeps into his stomach. The rapid patter of his heartbeat quickly turns from one of excitement to one of fear. There, in the doorway to the kitchen, are Bobby, Ellen, Jo, and Sam—evidently back from the store, grocery bags in their hands. Staring.

In that moment of complete shock, where they’re all just looking at each other, where they’re all trying to process what’s happening, Cas can acknowledge that he’s never seen any of them like this—this genuine shock. Complete and unguarded.

Cas steps away from Dean, breath coming in short pants. He straightens out his shirt discreetly but it doesn’t matter—there’s no hiding what he and Dean were doing, there’s no explaining it away.

Cas clenches his hands into fists to stop them trembling—it doesn’t work. His mouth is dry and his eyes are stinging and he’s terrified, he realizes. He’s absolutely fucking terrifed right now because he has no idea how they’re going to react.

Them supporting Cas’s sexuality is one thing. Being in a relationship with Dean is another entirely.

Cas looks at each of them in turn, trying to gauge how dire the situation is. His eyes land first on Jo: she’s white-knuckling the bags in her hands and her mouth is agape. There’s a dark flush across her cheeks and she blinks vacantly, apparently not even registering that Cas is looking at her. Her eyes remain fixed on Dean, and there—the slightest furrow of her brow and she lets out a breath. It seems she never suspected anything of Dean.

Cas’s eyes go to Bobby next and—Cas flinches minutely because Bobby looks angry. And Cas knows Bobby has every right to be; he’s protective of Dean, of course he is, and this Bobby doesn’t know him the way his Bobby knew him. But he knows Bobby trusted him—he’s not sure if he will after this. With the way Bobby is glaring daggers at him, Cas tears his gaze away—he can’t stand it.

He looks at Ellen next—her mouth is pressed into a thin line and her jaw is clenched. Her eyes too are on Cas, not Dean, and there’s a judgment there Cas has never seen from her. Disapproval radiates from her very stance and Cas shrinks in on himself further. The stinging in his eyes gets worse.

He doesn’t want to but Cas can’t help it—he looks to Sam next. Young Sam, a Sam unstained by the trauma of the devil and the details of his birthright, a Sam who has shown him nothing but kindness, nothing but gratitude. Sam’s gaze is unwaveringly on Dean, and he looks—sad. He looks very sad, the downturn of his mouth and the furrow of his brow. Cas knows from Dean that he never told anyone of his queerness. Cas wonders in that moment if Sam ever suspected or if the idea of Dean being with a man is new to him.

Cas doesn’t get to think on it for long, though, because all too soon they recover and the silence is broken. Cas glances back at Dean—he’s frozen solid against the fridge and he looks absolutely terrified. Something in Cas just aches at the muted look of horror on his face, and he automatically goes to reach for Dean. Bobby’s voice, low and hard, stops him in his tracks.

“Cas, living room—now.”

There’s no room for argument or protest. And he doesn’t want to make things worse, doesn’t want to make this harder for Dean. Cas spares him one last glance, but Dean doesn’t look his way once—his eyes are locked somewhere in the distance, gaze empty, and he barely breathes.

“I’ll be right back,” Cas says anyway, but Dean doesn’t react.

Cas swallows thickly, blinking back the tears in his eyes, and he follows Bobby to the living room.

The walk to the living room with Bobby may as well have been a walk to the gallows. The utter dread Cas feels is unparalleled; he has never known this specific type of horror. By the time he fell in love with the Dean in his time, everyone Dean cared about already knew him. Bobby, Sam, even Charlie. Despite Cas’s own reservations of how Dean would react should Cas tell him how he felt, he never once doubted that their family would support them.

Cas doesn’t have that same surety here. And in fact, it’s looking like he has every reason not to.

“Bobby, I—” Cas starts but Bobby holds up a hand, and Cas goes quiet immediately. There’s a carefully contained rage on Bobby’s face that Cas is unaccustomed to being on the receiving end of. He doesn’t think the Bobby from his time was ever this angry with him—and that includes the time when he tried to become God and slaughtered countless people.

“I consider myself a very reasonable man,” Bobby says, every word bitten out like it’s physically painful for him to do so. “But so help me God, Cas—”

“I love him,” Cas blurts out. Bobby stops, faltering. That shock, again. Cas swallows thickly. “I’m in love with him,” he says quietly. “I know this must come as a surprise to you, and I know what Dean means to you, Bobby, believe me—but I’m in love with him. And God knows I do not say that lightly.”

Cas takes a deep breath. Bobby’s shoulders are still tense, nearly hunched up to his ears, but he’s quietly watching Cas—he’s allowing him to speak. It’s an opportunity he doesn’t intend to fuck up.

“You know what I lost,” Cas says. “And when I came here, I swear to you—I wasn’t looking for anything like—like this. I couldn’t help it.”

And the tears in Cas’s eyes fall down his face now, wetting tracks through the flour he can feel still stuck to his skin.

“After I lost my family, I never could have imagined—” Cas cuts himself off, shaking his head. Clears his throat and tries again. “I meant what I said to you. I am so, so grateful for everything you’ve done for me. But please—you have to understand. What I have with Dean—it isn’t simple and it isn’t something I take for granted. I am in love with him. And I know I could never deserve someone like him but—he makes me happy. The way he makes me feel, I haven’t felt since before I lost my family.”

Cas lets out a shaky breath, wiping futilely at his tears.

“If you tell me to leave, I will,” Cas says, feels like the words are being clawed out through throat, feels like he’s dying, like he doesn’t even care that he is. “If that’s what you want—if you ask me—I’ll do it. I’ll respect that, because I respect you. But please—I’m begging you. You have to know. I am in love with Dean and what happens next isn’t going to change that. You can hate me, and I will still love him. Dean could hate me and I will still love him. The world could end and we could all die tomorrow and I would still love him. Some truths cannot be altered by circumstance and this is one of them: I am in love with Dean. I will continue to love Dean, no matter what you decide.”

Then, silence. At the very least, Cas has said his piece: he’s said what he needs to say and regardless of what Bobby does next, Cas can tell he’s heard him. His face is drawn and contemplative and Cas holds his breath.

The curve, that pinpoint. Cas waits to see how everything will change. His fate is in Bobby’s hands.

“Yer gonna start from the beginning,” Bobby says slowly. “And you’re gonna tell me everything. Then I’m gonna decide whether or not I need to kick your ass. We clear?”

All of Cas’s breath leaves him a rush. He nods, feeling light-headed.

“We’re clear,” Cas says shakily.

“Good,” Bobby says, voice hard. “Now start talkin’.”

So Cas does.

Cas weaves his story in stops and starts, being careful what to include and what to leave out. He obviously doesn’t mention any of the more explicit parts, but he tells the truth: from befriending Dean, and gaining his trust, to Dean coming onto him, and their decision to be exclusive. The last several weeks of their secret dates, trying to out-romance each other. Admitting he’s in love with Dean, and Dean saying it back.

Throughout his story, Bobby doesn’t say a word. His face is carefully neutral and no matter what Cas says, his jaw remains clenched and his mouth pressed into a thin line. The only clue that gives away what may be going on inside his head is his eyes: bright and focused where they’re fixed on Cas, occasionally narrowing or going wide with surprise.

By the time Cas has covered everything—including the scene earlier in the kitchen, explaining that they were just joking around with each other—the house is eerily quiet. Cas has absolutely no idea where the others, including Dean, are. What they might be saying to him. How he’s doing.

The running undercurrent of his worry for Dean gets worse the longer he goes without seeing him, and it’s beginning to make him antsy. He knows he has to be careful with how he handles things with Bobby, but Dean is first and foremost his main concern. And he knows he really needs to talk to Dean.

But for right now, that clearly isn’t an option.

Cas runs a tired hand through his hair and waits. For a while, Bobby just peers at him, seemingly assessing. Cas gets the impression he’s carefully choosing what he’s going to say.

“Alright,” Bobby says finally, face unreadable. “I think I got it—most of it, anyway. Tell me this: exactly how long were you planning on keepin’ this thing a secret?”

“As long as Dean needed,” Cas says immediately. “I know that—everyone’s experience with queerness is different.” Cas swallows, considering. He doesn’t want to say it wrong. “I may have had bad experiences with it in the past—with my family—but I’ve had plenty of time to come to terms with who I am, and how people perceive me. I’m not saying it’s easy, but regardless of how people react, I’m at a place in my life where I’m comfortable with other people knowing I’m gay. It would be—unfair of me, to put that same expectation on Dean, when his experience may have been different than mine.”

“May have been?” Bobby says pointedly. Cas shrugs.

“I don’t presume and I’m not going to speak on his behalf—not about this. Frankly, Dean doesn’t like to talk about it and I’m not going to push him if he’s not ready. I know Dean has his reasons for wanting to keep this to ourselves.”

Cas hesitates, weighs whether he should bring it up. In the end, he decides he has nothing to lose. Everything’s already out in the open.

“To be honest,” Cas says carefully. “I was under the impression that Dean hasn’t been in many serious relationships. He’s still so young.”

“Exactly,” Bobby bites out. “He’s twenty-seven fucking years old, Cas. So you can see my problem.”

“I know,” Cas says quietly. “I don’t—I don’t want you to think this is a pattern, for me—that I only date young men. That’s not what this is, Bobby.”

Cas takes a deep breath, steels himself against the heavy glare Bobby is now directing his way. Being earnest has gotten him this far—his vulnerability might be the only thing that has a chance to salvage this situation.

“I’ve only been in love once before this,” Cas says. “And it was with my best friend. I told you about him before. We raised my son, Jack, together. I loved him Bobby—so much that it changed me. It changed my life forever. You could never understand just how much. And the best, most beautiful part of my life—loving him—ended the way it feels like every good thing in my life ends: in tragedy. But now I’m here and I’ve been given this—this second chance. And I’m in love again and I—I don’t want this to be that. For once, I want to be in love and have it be happy. I want to be in love without it being doomed.”

Cas swallows thickly, breathing in, out, in, out. These are thoughts he hasn’t even voiced to Dean because they’re too painful to articulate most of the time but—this matters.

“I have to believe that there’s more to my life than loss,” Cas says. “And when I’m with Dean—it feels like being proven right. I know good things happen. And when I’m with him—when we’re together—it’s a refrain. Like a song. I dare the world to give me something good, to show me something beautiful that isn’t ugly at its core and—there he is.”

Cas closes his eyes, lets himself take a moment. Can only say the next part aloud to the darkness behind his eyelids, because it’s something he can hardly admit to himself, let alone to another person.

“It’s hard for me to trust the good things in my life,” Cas whispers. “It’s not that I’m trusting that Dean is a good thing. It’s that I believe that even if he isn’t, even if I’ll lose this, too, it’s worth it to love him anyway. Even if it falls apart, even if it kills me—it’s worth it. Because loving him makes me a better man. I like who I am, when I’m with him. I like who he makes me want to be.”

Silence. Only silence. When Cas finally opens his eyes, hands trembling with his nerves, Bobby’s expression is unreadable. For a heart-stopping moment, Cas thinks this will be it: Bobby will tell him to leave and Cas will never see Dean again. He’ll lose everything for the second and final time, and he’ll end up the way he always knew he would: alone. Abandoned.

Then Bobby sighs, rugged and sharp, like he’s frustrated, like he’s angry—like he’s about to say something he’ll grow to regret.

“I don’t like it,” Bobby says plainly. “Dean’s just a kid, and you’re a man, Cas. ‘N I don’t see how that’s fair to him. Now, I can see you care about ‘im. I ain’t denying that. But my job is to look after Dean—whether he likes it or not. I know yer a good man, Cas, but have you ever stopped to ask yourself: are you good for Dean?”

Something in Cas’s chest aches and his tears return with a vengeance.

He owes Bobby this, and Dean: so Cas considers. He thinks of laying beneath the stars and beneath the bedsheets, sharing beers and secret smiles. Dean’s breath against his mouth and the feeling of his heartbeat; Dean’s trust, and his want, and how freely Dean gives himself over to Cas, how gladly he surrenders to him. He knows Dean loves him. He knows he makes Dean happy.

Cas thinks of sharing a cigarette with Dean on the porch, talking about their queerness and Dean’s biting words: If you want to scream from the rooftops that you’re gay, then fine. But that’s not who I am.

He thinks of Dean’s head on his shoulder, that first night after they made love. How Dean had guided him, had taught him. He reassured Cas when Dean was the one with every right to be nervous, Dean was the one taking a risk. Dean’s worry disguised as anger, manifesting as pointed barbs and back-handed comments. Dean accusing Cas of protecting him in a hunt to impress him. Shoving Cas back when Cas spoke poorly of Dean’s father.

He thinks of that first night Dean offered to be his friend: his nervousness, his vulnerability, his gratitude. How far they’ve come, and how much they’ve shared, and the memories they’ve created together.

And this, the only reason they’re here—playing-fighting with Dean in the kitchen, tussling and throwing flour. Joking about breaking up because Cas knows that Dean loves him and Dean knows that Cas loves him, to the point where they can joke about it.

Cas can’t say for sure that he’s good for Dean but it goes beyond that. He knows Dean.

“He gets angry when he’s scared,” Cas blurts out. He isn’t sure how to articulate what he wants to say, so he lets the words come freely, without thinking too hard about it. “And the times when he acts like he’s unafraid is when he’s most afraid. His confrontation is almost all performative. And he—he loves.”

Cas’s voice cracks but he doesn’t care, pushes forward anyway.

“He loves so much. He’s unendingly loyal—even to people that hurt him. And he listens, even when he acts like he isn’t. And he’s kind and he’s brave and he’s—he’s so much more than I will ever deserve, but Bobby, I love him. And I know him. And I’ve seen the way his—”

The way his soul lights up around me, Cas thinks. He can’t say that, though.

“—I see how he acts around me, when it’s just us. I trust him. And when he tells me he loves me, I trust that, too. I won’t pretend that your concerns about our age disparity don’t hold merit. I even understand the impulse to come to that conclusion. But he isn’t a child, Bobby. He’s more intelligent than any of us give him credit for. I know you’re only looking out for him. Believe me, I want you to. Dean deserves to have someone like you in his corner. But don’t deny him the dignity of his choice. He—he wants to be with me. Isn’t that enough?”

For a long moment, Bobby just looks at him. Cas’s heart is in his throat and his stomach is roiling with nerves. This could go a hundred different ways, ninety-nine of them bad, but he doesn’t know what else he can do at this point. It’s out of his hands.

Bobby slowly raises his hand—his finger pointing right at Cas, eyebrows raised, mouth downturned. A tentative hope blooms low in his gut and Cas waits, sweat beading on his brow.

“I don’t like it,” Bobby repeats slowly, enunciating every word. “I stand by what I said, Cas. He’s too young for you. But—but—you’re right. It’s Dean’s decision. I only want what’s best for him. If his choice is to be with you, then I’ll stand by ‘im. But if you hurt him—”

“I won’t,” Cas says softly. “That’s—I won’t. That’s the last thing I want, Bobby. If you’re going to listen to anything I say today, listen to that. I don’t want to hurt him.”

Bobby sighs, running a hand down his face. All at once, he looks tired.

“Jesus Christ,” he mumbles. “Can’t get one day of goddamn peace around here.”

“It was never my intention to cause any of you distress,” Cas says quietly. “Least of all Dean. I’m sorry that—I wish you hadn’t found out this way. I wish—I wish we had waited until Dean was ready.”

“Yeah, I gotta talk to him,” Bobby mutters but it’s quiet enough that Cas knows he’s saying it more to himself than to Cas.

“Please be kind to him,” Cas says. “He’s—he cares very much what you think. I know you’re angry with me, so make that clear to him. I don’t want him to think you’re upset that he’s with a man.”

“The hell do you take me for, huh?” Bobby scowls. “I ain’t stupid. I’ve known that boy since he was in diapers. Don’t act like you know ‘im better than I do.”

Cas very pointedly keeps his mouth shut. Best not to touch that one.

Bobby sighs again, crossing his arms and fixing Cas with one more stern look.

“This conversation ain’t over,” Bobby says. “But right now, I got bigger concerns than you. Just—give ‘im some space. And I mean that, Cas. We all need some time to calm down. So don’t poke the bear, alright?”

Cas most definitely does not want to give Dean space right now—in fact, that’s the exact opposite of what he wants—but he’s self-aware enough to know that Bobby isn’t asking.

“Alright,” Cas says reluctantly. “I’ll just—I’ll be in my room, then.” Cas pauses. “I know we made a mess in the kitchen—I can clean it up, if you like.”

“Forget it,” Bobby says, waving him off. “Let me worry about that. Just—go. Okay? Let me talk to my family in private.”

It’s the distinction—let me talk to my family—that hurts Cas the most. There was a time when Bobby’s family was his family. There was a time when they would forgive Cas for anything, trust him with anything, but that time is long lost to him.

“Of course,” Cas whispers.

Cas retreats to his room and he doesn’t come out again for the rest of the night.

When Cas hears a knock at his bedroom door late that night, after he’s long given up hope of Dean coming to see him, it bursts bright and unexpected in his chest. His elation is so sudden, so fierce, that he immediately jumps to his feet and rushes to the door, swinging it open, and—

Cas stops, disappointment settling over him abruptly. Sam stands in his doorway, stance unsure. Cas considers him quietly, reigning in his surprise. He hadn’t expected this, honestly.

“Sam,” Cas says carefully. “What are you—is everything alright?”

“Yeah,” Sam says quietly. He nods to Cas’s room. “Can we talk?”

Cas lets out a heavy breath but opens the door wider, letting Sam step inside his room and closing the door after him.

This is uncharted territory in more ways than one. Because he doesn’t know this Sam the way he knew his Sam; they haven’t spent nearly as much time together and this Sam formed his opinion of Cas under very different circumstances. Cas feels quite possibly more out of his depth than he did with Bobby, and that’s saying something.

Because if there’s anyone whose opinion matters more than Bobby’s, it’s Sam’s. Cas knows how much Dean loves his brother. And if there’s anyone, in this world or in his, whose approval Cas desires, it’s Sam’s.

“Is Dean okay?” Cas says. He knows he should probably let Sam say his piece, and he will—but this is more important. “I just—I haven’t seen him since this morning, and I’m worried. Please, just—is he alright?”

For a moment, Sam just looks at him, mouth pressed in a thin line. He looks more uncomfortable than angry but Cas won’t count it out just yet.

“He’s okay,” Sam says softly, something in his face shifting. “I mean, he was pretty shaken up when—well, you know. He’s asleep. Or pretending to be asleep, honestly. But I know when to let him be.”

Cas sighs, running a hand through his hair. Dean typically tries to avoid confronting uncomfortable topics but Cas knows this isn’t something he can put off forever. He wonders if Dean blames him for the others finding out.

“Right,” Cas says, voice hollow. The stubborn singing of tears in his eyes returns but he blinks them back. He doesn’t want to cry in front of Sam, not now.

“Look, I’ll just get to the point,” Sam says. “I know Bobby already reamed you out. That’s not why I’m here.”

“Okay,” Cas says slowly. “So—why are you here, then?”

“Dean wouldn’t tell me much,” Sam says. “About what’s going on with you two, I mean. I’m not asking for details, that’s not my place, but I need to know: what you have with him, it’s serious?”

“Yes,” Cas says, because it is. At least it is to him.

“Are you in love with him?” Sam says and—Cas blinks, momentarily stunned. He hadn’t expected Sam to be that straightforward. Perhaps Cas has been underestimating him.

“Yes,” Cas says again. “I love him very much.”

Sam just watches him, eyes searching, before nodding once.

“Okay.”

“Okay?” Cas says carefully.

“Okay,” Sam repeats, voice firm. “Look, I’m not gonna act like I know exactly what’s going on here, but I know my brother. And after our dad died, he was a mess. We both were. But lately—he’s been different. Lighter, almost. Like he isn’t hurting the way he was before. And it—it happened gradually enough that I almost didn’t notice it. But I do now. And I know some of it’s because of you.”

Tears fall unbidden down Cas’s cheeks and he feels a wave of gratitude for Sam wash over him all at once. After enduring Bobby’s—albeit entirely deserved—interrogation earlier, this a relief, it’s a goddamn relief. To hear something kind, for someone to say he’s good for Dean. To not question himself for someone else Dean cares about.

“That means a lot to me,” Cas chokes out, wiping hastily at his tears. “Thank you, Sam. I—I appreciate you saying that.”

“Look,” Sam sighs. “Just give him some time, okay? You gotta be patient, but he’ll come around. Dean always does. I think he’s just—freaked out right now.”

“I know,” Cas says. “I’ll give him time. I’ll—let him come to me. Just—keep an eye on him? I know he might not be ready to talk about it, but even just letting him know you’re there, I just—I don’t want him to feel lonely.”

Sam offers him a smile, small but genuine.

“For what it’s worth,” Sam says. “I’m glad he met you. No matter what happens next, I’ll always be grateful. And I haven’t forgotten what you’ve done for me, or for Dean. You took a knife for both of us. The risks you’ve taken, I know what they mean for hunters. And I know I told you before but—thank you.”

“It’s my pleasure,” Cas says, because it is.

Sam sends him one last smile before leaving, shutting the door quietly behind him.

Cas gets in bed, silently willing sleep to come. It never does.

On Christmas morning, Cas drags himself out of bed not having gotten a minute of sleep. He doesn’t need it, not really—he’s still an angel, after all—but it’s become a part of his routine these past several months, so he feels off when he gets up. Like some vital step has been missed.

Cas knows his exhaustion stems more from the events of the day prior than from his actual lack of sleep. He spent the last eight hours laying in bed, staring at the ceiling, thinking about every single way today could go wrong. He’s tired, to put it mildly.

Cas walks to the living room after a good twenty minutes of psyching himself up. He feels better after a quick shower and he can hear quiet chatter coming from the other room. He knows the others are out there and he knows he has to face them eventually. He owes them more than hiding in his bedroom—he owes himself more. So he pulls on his jacket—shivering against the cold, the damn heater must be malfunctioning again—and goes out to face the inevitable.

When Cas first rounds the corner, there’s a precious few moments before anyone notices him where he gets to simply observe. Jo is tucked under Ellen’s arm on the couch, their faces creased with laughter. Bobby is saying something to Sam and Dean, a snarky comment by the look on Bobby’s face and the smiles the boys are sharing. In that moment, the morning is perfect; it’s Christmas and they’re together and there’s festive music playing quietly from the radio on Bobby’s desk. Cas aches. This is how it’s supposed to be. In a perfect world, this is how Cas would imagine spending the holidays with the Winchesters. This is what it would look like.

Then Jo catches sight of him hovering in the doorway and she freezes. Cas watches the way her entire body tenses against her mom and Ellen turns to her, then follows her gaze to Cas. The room falls quiet and everyone’s eyes go to him.

Everyone except Dean. Dean, who is staring at the floor, his face red and his stance rigid.

For one wild moment, Cas thinks of simply walking out the door and not coming back. Cas never wants to exist in a world where his presence is a burden to the people he loves rather than a pleasure, he never wants to be the reason a room goes silent. Cas never wants to be unsure of his place in his own home. Never wants to wonder if it’s even his home at all anymore.

But Cas has never known when to give up, and he can’t bring himself to walk away from them. Not now, not after how far they’ve come. Not when he’s finally learned the sweet ecstasy of Dean’s touch.

So Cas takes in a deep breath, calming his nerves the best he can.

He can do this. He’s survived far worse than an awkward family gathering. And if he can outsmart Death herself, he can deal with some damn staring.

Cas clears his throat, taking an unsure step forward.

“May I join you?” Cas says quietly.

They all exchange glances, eyebrows raised and lips pursed. For a moment, Cas feels irritation bubble in the pit of his stomach. He knows they’re upset with him—and they even have a right to be—but do they really need to punish him like this? On Christmas day, in front of everyone?

Cas bites his tongue until it bleeds. He won’t make this worse.

There’s a long moment where Cas genuinely thinks they’ll turn him away. The only person willing to make eye contact with him at all is Sam, and he’s looking at Cas like he feels sorry for him. It obviously doesn’t make Cas feel any better.

Then finally, finally, Bobby sighs, huffing and rolling his eyes. Arms crossed and stance hostile despite his words.

“You gonna sit or not?” Bobby snipes.

So Cas sits. He just picks a spot on the floor. He doesn’t want to get too close to any of them, doesn’t want to push his luck. He keeps his gaze trained on the ground, holding his breath, and waits.

It takes a minute, but conversation begins to pick up around him. No one speaks to him and he doesn’t try to speak to any of them. He just sits and lets the time pass.

As the minutes tick on, something cold and ugly begins to unfurl in his chest. This isn’t—this isn’t fair. This isn’t fucking fair.

And he knows he has no right to this specific anger. He knows Dean was their family first; they’re not going to hold Dean to the standard they hold Cas to, and they’re going to side with him over Cas every time. Cas understands that and he accepts it; that’s not the issue.

The issue is Cas’s worst fear is being reinforced before his eyes in the way he least expected it. Cas thinks back to his worries on Thanksgiving—knowing he’s the outsider. They had told him he could stay but—still, even now, or maybe now more than ever, he’s just the outsider.

The tragedy of it—the injustice of it—hits Cas like a bullet to the chest and he can’t breathe. Everything he’s sacrificed, all the ways he’s changed, how he tried to mold himself into a shape that was pleasing to the people he loved most—these are things that Cas has endured for the sake of having a family. All he’s ever done is for these people. And now, here he is, in 2006, hopelessly in love with Dean Winchester fucking again, and he’s paying the price for it, again.

Rinse. Repeat. It never fucking ends and Cas is sick of it.

The worst part is, when the tears come, Cas can’t stop them. He doesn’t even know why he’s crying, he’s more angry than upset, but they come anyway. Cas debates whether he can salvage his dignity. He’s been humiliated continuously since yesterday. It really can’t get any worse. And now he’s crying in the middle of the living room on Christmas morning but it doesn’t matter because no one’s paying enough attention to him to notice it.

Unbidden, a memory comes to Cas then, sharp in its clarity and devastating in its grief: that night in the bunker, Dean’s face hard and closed off, spewing cruel word after cruel word, hitting Cas exactly where it hurt him, because Dean knew Cas. Cas walking away and waiting for Dean to stop him. Dean letting him go.

Back then, Cas’s understanding of his own love for Dean was different than it is now. Back then, there was always the open question of reconciliation. Maybe Dean would make his way back to him. Maybe their paths would cross again. And maybe Dean could forgive him for it.

But here, now, Cas thinks he knows the answer to that question. Because even though Dean isn’t doing anything, he’s making a choice. His lack of action speaks volumes. Cas realizes with a stark clarity that Dean will never love him more than he hates himself.

Cas doesn’t want to play this game. He played it plenty in his time and he’s had enough. He’s far too old and he’s lost far too much to endure this again. He needs a straight answer and he’s not going to sit around waiting for it from people who seem all too content to punish him when he’s already well aware of what they think of him.

“Excuse me,” Cas says. The room falls silent abruptly—like a switch flipping. If Cas had the wherewithal to be embarrassed for everyone staring at him while he’s openly weeping, this would be the most humiliating moment of his life. As it is, he’s too angry to feel anything else. “I don’t mean to be rude, but I need to make something clear. I don’t enjoy passive aggression and I’m not skilled at reading social cues. And frankly, I don’t have the patience for this. I don’t want to be where I’m unwelcome, so please: if you want me to go, just say so. I will. I’ll leave and I won’t come back. But if you want me gone, you need to tell me that now. If you want me to stay, then you need to say so. I understand that you’re all upset with me, and I can respect that. But I don’t deserve to be treated this way.”

The silence that follows that proclamation is somehow worse than the first one. The stillness of the room feels like it’s suffocating him and—Dean’s finally looking at him, Cas realizes. He meets Dean’s eyes—they’re wide and Dean is frozen in his spot again. Cas aches, he fucking aches, because he thought Dean loved him. He thought he made Dean happy. But Dean can’t even say anything to him?

Cas has quite literally given an ultimatum and Dean is doing now what he did then: he’s letting Cas go.

Cas runs a ragged hand down his face, wiping angrily at his tears. He should’ve known better. He should’ve known.

Cas pushes himself to his feet numbly, furiously ignoring the trembling of his hands. He doesn’t look at anyone, doesn’t feel anything, as he turns and walks to his room. The thumping of his heart is drowning out any other noises in the house, and Cas doesn’t even know what he’s looking for until he’s pulling his trenchcoat out from the back of his closet. He hasn’t worn it since he got to this year but it’s the only thing he cares about enough to take with him.

His keys are on his bedside dresser. He hasn’t driven that shitty Honda Civic in months. Distantly, Cas wonders if the engine will even start when he turns the ignition. With his luck, it probably won’t.

Well, he’ll have to cross that bridge when he comes to it. Besides, he has bigger problems right now. If it comes down to it, he’ll just fucking walk back to that goddamn motel.

Cas spares one last glance around the room—his room. So much changed within these four walls, so much was born anew. He told Dean he loved him in this room. Dean kissed him for the first time in this room. They made love in this room. These walls bore witness to most incredible moments of Castiel’s existence—peeling paint and the weathered comforter on a squeaky mattress, not even the angels were granted the privilege of seeing that pinpoint firsthand. This room has seen more monumental events of Cas’s existence than all of Heaven combined.

Cas turns off the lights and closes the door behind him. It seems all good things really do come to an end eventually. He was right, all those years ago, Cas thinks bitterly. Life is rarely ever happy. Even when it is, it doesn’t last.

But perhaps that’s exactly what Cas deserves.

Cas is so lost in his own head that it genuinely startles him when he feels a hand on his shoulder. He jumps, torn abruptly from his thoughts, and when he glances over his shoulder, he finds himself looking directly at Dean.

There’s nothing Cas can tell himself right now to make this easier, to make this hurt less. And there’s nothing he can say to Dean to make him understand why this matters to him. He misses when he didn’t need to say it, when Dean just knew. But Cas knows he expects far too much from Dean and it isn’t fair to him.

Then again, none of this is fair.

“You still love me, right?” Dean says and—Cas stops. It takes a moment for Cas’s brain to get back on track. He opens his mouth, closes it, opens it again—he’s effectively rendered speechless. That was quite possibly the last thing he expected Dean to say.

Dean’s eyes grow wide as Cas gapes at him, trying to force a word, any word, out of his goddamn mouth, and something like hurt settles over Dean’s face.

“Oh,” Dean says quietly. “Alright then.”

“What—no,” Cas blurts out. “Dean, of course I love you. Why would you—how could you even ask me that?”

“You’re leaving,” Dean says, his voice somewhere between panic and anger. “You’re leaving me right now but you don’t get why I’d think that?”

“Dean, you haven’t spoken a single word to me since they found us yesterday,” Cas snaps. “And I laid awake all night wondering if you hated me now. When your family chose to humiliate me rather than communicate like adults, you sat by and watched it happen. I do love you, Dean, but I have self-respect, too, and I don’t tolerate that kind of behavior. Why should I sit back and endure the abuse when you’ve given me no reason to think you even want me around anymore?”

Dean’s face flushes pink all the way down to his neck and tears well in his eyes. Cas can feel a mirroring burn in his own. He hates hurting Dean, he fucking hates it, and he doesn’t even understand why they’re fighting.

They—they had been happy. How the hell did they get here?

Dean looks away, face crumpling and Cas—Cas doesn’t want this. Even if he has to leave, he doesn’t want this.

Without thinking about it, without letting himself second-guess it, Cas steps forward and reaches out for Dean, settling a gentle hand against his cheek. Dean’s eyes flutter closed as tears continue to run tracks down his face, Cas’s thumb sweeping carefully across Dean’s cheekbone. Drying his tears.

“Nothing could ever make me stop loving you, Dean,” Cas says, voice trembling. “Not even you.”

Dean’s eyes open and he holds Cas’s gaze. His eyes are bloodshot and his face is hot against Cas’s palm but he doesn’t look away.

“Promise me?” Dean whispers.

Cas steps closer without thinking about it, letting the sweet intensity of Dean’s gaze pull him in.

“I promise,” Cas says.

“So you’re staying, right?” Dean says, voice strained. Cas swallows thickly.

“Dean—”

“Right?” Dean repeats. Cas watches him through the tears blurring his vision, considering him quietly.

“Do you want me to stay, Dean?”

Dean shakes his head, seemingly frustrated, and he lets out an explosive breath.

“You said you understood,” Dean says, voice accusatory, crying in earnest now. “Wanting things you shouldn’t want. I thought—I thought you wanted me.”

“I do,” Cas insists, feels like the words are being torn out his throat. “God, Dean, I—I do.”

“Then have me,” Dean says. His voice is harried and frantic, and Cas has never seen Dean like this before, never seen him so open in his desperation. “I know I’m fucked up and an asshole and—and a shitty boyfriend, but I wasn’t lying when I said I love you. And I didn’t say anything because—because I’m fucking terrified, Cas!”

For a moment, Cas is taken aback at Dean’s tone of voice. His eyes are wild and his movements are jerky and concern is growing in the pit of Cas’s stomach. Dean isn’t—he doesn’t look okay, and this goes beyond a simple fight.

“I’m not like you, okay?” Dean exclaims. “I’m not brave like you! I can’t just not care what people think about me! You were right about me, from the start! I ain’t proud of who I am ‘cause I learned from the get-go that being a fag is a fucking death sentence, and I know better than that! You think I wanted to love you? You think it’s easy for me? I’m terrified all the fuckin’ time but—but it was okay, because every time we’re together, the fear don’t matter as much! You told me that loving a man felt like finally loving yourself. Well, I haven’t loved myself a day in my fucking life, but you make me want to! You make me feel like I could!”

And all at once, Cas understands.

Dean’s shaking—he can see it in his hands and his shoulders, and Cas reaches out. His mind is shockingly clear. Everything else falls away and all he sees is Dean.

“Come here,” Cas says, leaving no room for argument. Dean offers none anyway, stepping into Cas’s arms. Cas pulls him against his chest, and combs his fingers through his hair. Dean’s face nuzzles against the curve of his neck, and Cas lets his head rest atop Dean’s. He breathes him in over and over, letting his heartbeat slowly return to normal. Dean is trembling against him but Cas holds him through it, never wavering, never letting go. And bit by bit, Dean begins to settle.

“Forgive me, Dean,” Cas murmurs against his hair. “I didn’t understand at first but—I do now. I’m sorry.”

“I wasn’t lying,” Dean chokes out and Cas shushes him, rubbing circles into his back. “I love you, Cas. I love you. I—”

“I know,” Cas interrupts gently. “I know, Dean. It’s okay. I love you, too.”

Cas can feel where Dean’s hands clench spasmodically in his tee shirt.

“Even now?” Dean says quietly.

“Especially now,” Cas says.

The minutes blend together meaninglessly and Cas loses all track of time. All he can focus on is Dean shaking in his arms.

When it seems like Dean has finally calmed down—when Cas himself has finally managed to stop crying—Cas carefully extricates Dean from him. Dean protests at first, letting out a soft noise and gripping tight to Cas’s side. Cas mutters nonsensical reassurances, pressing a kiss to his forehead.

“It’s alright,” he murmurs, taking Dean’s face in his hands. “Dean, please look at me.”

Dean meets his eyes reluctantly. They’re bloodshot and Dean’s face is flushed all the way down to his neck, stained with tear tracks.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Cas says firmly. “And you’re not a shitty boyfriend. Please don’t talk about yourself that way.”

Dean releases a breath somewhere between a sob and a laugh and he lets his head fall onto Cas’s shoulder. Cas allows it, keeping Dean tucked into his side.

“You are very brave, Dean,” Cas says quietly. “Never let anyone make you think otherwise. Not even me. Or yourself.”

“Thanks, Cas,” Dean whispers. Cas begins stroking through his hair, listening intently, pulling very minutely on his grace to keep track of Dean’s heartbeat. Slowly but surely, it returns to normal, and Cas lets out a breath of relief.

At this point, Cas just wants to lay down and frankly, Dean needs to, as well.

A bed, he should get them to a bed. Cas looks up, wondering what the best way is to convince Dean to rest and—oh, goddamn it. How long have they been there?

Bobby, Ellen, Jo, and Sam are watching from the doorway. They’re all in varying states of disarray. Sam has very clearly been crying and Jo’s face is white as a sheet. Ellen has that unreadable look back on her face but Bobby just looks sad.

Cas knows he should probably be embarrassed from them overhearing God only knows how much of that, but he can’t bring himself to. In fact, at this point, it’s the least of his worries. Cas doesn’t know if he can salvage their perception of him, anyway. Fuck what they think of him. Dean’s well-being is always going to come before it.

“Come on,” Cas mutters. “You should lay down, Dean.”

“‘M not tired,” Dean protests, but his words are slurred and he doesn’t pick up his head from Cas’s shoulder.

“You are,” Cas says gently. “You need to rest.”

Dean nuzzles against Cas’s neck and Cas sighs.

“Dean, did you get any sleep last night?” Cas says.

“No.”

“Then let’s go lay down,” Cas whispers. “We both need sleep.”

At that, Dean finally raises his head, fixing red eyes on Cas.

“Are you tired?” Dean asks.

Cas huffs, shaking his head, lips curling into a smile despite himself. Of course Dean would be looking out for him even now.

“I am,” Cas says softly. “And you need to learn to take better care of yourself, Dean.”

“Hey, you know me,” Dean says. “I’m all about that self-care shit.”

That gets a laugh out of Cas and he learns forward to press another kiss to Dean’s forehead. He lets himself stay there for a moment, eyes falling closed, just savoring Dean’s nearness. He’s always loved being close to Dean like this.

“Let’s go,” Cas whispers. He leads Dean back to his room and Dean follows.

Cas doesn’t look back at the others. Neither does Dean.

Later, when Dean is snoring softly against Cas’s chest, and a knock sounds at the door, Cas seriously contemplates ignoring it. Today quite literally could not have gone worse and he’s completely fucking exhausted. The only reason he’s still awake is to make sure Dean doesn’t have any nightmares and he doesn’t want to have to deal with anything else right now.

Still, after the scene he just caused, Cas doesn’t really have any other options. He sighs heavily. This Christmas fucking sucks.

“Come in,” Cas calls out, keeping his voice pitched low.

The moment the door opens and Sam peeks his head through, Cas immediately raises a finger to his lips.

“I don’t want to wake him,” Cas says quietly. “So keep your voice down, please.”

Sam nods. He opens the door wider to reveal Jo standing uncertainly behind him. Cas sighs again.

“Well, come in if you’re going to come in,” he says.

The two quickly make their way inside his room, silently closing the door behind themselves. For a moment, they just watch him. Cas can see how their faces change when they look at Dean, twin masks of concern.

“Look,” Sam says. “We just wanted to make sure Dean was okay.”

“Well, I suppose it depends on your definition of ‘okay’,” Cas says. “He fell asleep about twenty minutes ago.”

“We don’t want you to think this is what we’re like,” Jo says suddenly. “Look, I know things have been tense since yesterday—”

Cas’s bitter laugh cuts her off.

“That’s an understatement,” Cas says sourly. “And the tension wasn’t the issue. I know I’ve been a guest here but—I suppose I thought you respected me enough to at least give me the benefit of the doubt.”

“I don’t think it’s about respect,” Sam says. “Bobby and Ellen are trying to figure out what to do right now. But we just—”

“Got tired of listening to them argue,” Jo supplies. Sam nods.

“Besides,” Sam adds. “We don’t really see it the same way they do. I just—I just want my brother to be happy.”

“I know,” Cas says, gentler now. “And I appreciate you both being here. But frankly, I don’t want to make things any worse.”

Cas runs a hand through his hair, letting out a deep breath.

“Look, you know them better than I do,” Cas says lowly. “Should I—do I need to start packing?”

“It’s not that they want you to leave, Cas,” Jo says. “Besides, I think it’s pretty clear Dean won’t let that happen.”

“They may not give me a choice,” Cas says. “What do you mean, they don’t want me to leave?”

Sam and Jo exchange a look Cas can’t quite decipher and he realizes all at once that there’s some piece of the story he’s missing.

“What don’t I know?” Cas says suddenly.

“I don’t know if it’s my place to say,” Sam says, voice halting. “But after Bobby chewed you out, Dean talked to him and Ellen. I mean—they told us to give them some privacy but…”

“What were we supposed to do?” Jo says. “Not listen in? They were treating us like kids. And we had a right to know what was going on. This is our home, too.”

“The point is,” Sam cuts in. “Dean made it very clear to them that if they try to kick you out, he’s just gonna go with you. And I think—well, honestly, I think it kind of took them by surprise.”

A pesky stinging returns to Cas’s eyes and it feels like his heart is trying to crawl out through his throat.

“Dean—Dean said that?” Cas chokes out.

“Yeah, he did,” Sam says quietly. “For the record: we don’t want you to leave. Look, Bobby’s always been really protective of Dean. And it’s not easy for Dean to stand up to him. I know Bobby’s opinion of him holds a lot of weight to him. What happened in the living room—people don’t usually call him out like that. Or, any of us, really,” Sam adds.

“We just wanna be sure you’re not gonna up and disappear in the middle of the night,” Jo says.

Something broken and hurting that’s been festering in Cas since his argument with Bobby finally settles at that. Cas takes a deep breath in, lets a deep breath out. For the first time in what feels like a long time, Cas knows exactly what he’s going to do.

“I’m not leaving,” Cas says firmly. “And I’m not leaving Dean. But I meant what I said before: I don’t want to be where I’m unwelcome. If Bobby and Ellen wish to speak to me, I have no objections to that. But I’d like to do it sooner rather than later. I don’t like not knowing where I stand with people I care about.”

“We’ll let them know,” Sam says. “Y’know, as soon as they’re done shouting at each other.”

Cas sighs.

“Alright, thank you. Both of you.”

“Will you come get us if he needs anything?” Sam says, nodding to Dean. “I just—I get why he’s not comfortable coming to me right now. But I need to know that he’s okay.”

“Of course,” Cas says softly. “Don’t worry, Sam. I’ll watch over him.”

“Alright,” Sam sighs. “C’mon, Jo. I think at the very least we deserve a beer.”

“Damn right,” Jo mumbles.

They both send him a wave and then they’re gone, the door clicking shut behind him.

Cas strokes his hand in soothing circles on Dean’s back, blinking back stubborn tears.

“You don’t know, do you?” Cas whispers. “You have so many people who love you, Dean.”

As it turns out, Cas doesn’t have to wait long to speak to Bobby and Ellen. It intimidates him, more than his initial conversation with Bobby did. The two of them together are a powerhouse in any normal circumstance, but when it comes to protecting Dean? Cas knows it isn’t going to be easy.

When a second knock sounds at his bedroom door several hours after the first, Cas initially assumes it’s just Sam and Jo coming to check on Dean again. Luckily, he’s been sleeping like a rock since this morning. Cas dozed in and out of consciousness for a few hours, but after the last 24 hours he’s had, he’s content to simply lay and watch Dean sleep.

When Bobby and Ellen are the ones to open the door, though, Cas knows this isn’t something he can put off.

He’s careful to not rouse Dean as he lays him on the pillows and pulls the comforter up to his shoulders. Cas knows from experience that Dean isn’t a super heavy sleeper, but by some miracle of God, he doesn’t wake.

Cas doesn’t put up a protest when Bobby and Ellen lead him out to the porch for more privacy. Sitting on the steps under the night sky, Cas is reminded suddenly that it’s Christmas night. They never really got to celebrate.

“We need to talk,” Ellen says simply.

“I know we do,” Cas says. “Please just—be straightforward with me. I would appreciate it.”

“We can do that—so long as you return the favor,” Ellen says.

Cas nods. Ellen and Bobby share some indecipherable look—God only knows what the two of them have been talking (or arguing) about for the last few hours.

There’s a protracted silence—Cas’s eyebrows raise bit by bit as he waits. Finger tapping nervously on his knee, Cas opens his mouth, then closes it. He doesn’t want to rush them but—

“Oh, for Chirst’s sake, Bobby,” Ellen groans. “Would you just get it over with and say it?”

Bobby rolls his eyes, mouth twisted down in irritation, but he sighs long and heavy before fixing his gaze on Cas.

“I’m sorry,” Bobby says and his voice is earnest. “‘Bout earlier today, I mean. You were right. No one deserves to be treated like that.”

“Thank you,” Cas says softly. “I appreciate that.”

“I’m just gonna cut to the chase,” Bobby says. “I ain’t losing my boy over this. But I want what’s best for ‘im. And right now I’m not convinced that yer it.”

“So what will it take?” Cas asks quietly. “You want to trust me. I want that, too. So tell me what it will take, and I’ll do it.”

“You told me before that you don’t make a habit of dating young men,” Bobby says slowly. “‘N fact, you only ever mentioned one other man. Just the one.”

“I did.”

A pause where Cas can’t quite tell where this is going—and then: “Who was he?”

Cas swallows thickly. He can feel thin tendrils of panic wrapping slowly around him and he pushes it down. He isn’t going to waver, he isn’t going to falter, because he can’t. And he’s not going to fuck this up.

Cas takes a deep breath, steadying himself.

“What do you want to know?” Cas says.

“How old was he?” Ellen says. She crosses her arms and leans back on the step, looking for all the world like she’s settling in for an interrogation.

“He was forty-one when he died,” Cas says, because it isn’t a lie.

“And when was that?” Bobby says.

Cas pauses. In that moment, he frankly can’t remember if he’s given a specific timeline of events to them before and he can’t risk getting caught in a lie. That being said, he knows what the date was, and he thinks that’s his safest play.

“November fifth,” Cas says.

“So it’s only been a year,” Ellen says, eyebrow raised.

“Yes,” Cas says hesitantly.

“And you’re already jumping back into another serious relationship?” She adds pointedly.

And—wait. Cas frowns.

“We weren’t,” Cas says. “I was in love with him, yes, but we were never together.”

“You said yer family abandoned you ‘cause you chose him over them,” Bobby says.

“They did,” Cas says. “But we weren’t a couple. And I didn’t tell him of my feelings until—until right before he died. The day he died, in fact.”

“Why?”

Cas considers Bobby quietly. This is more than he’s comfortable talking about, and it’s not even about how careful he needs to be. His relationship with the Dean in his time is—private. It’s important to him. Special. And these people will never know enough about him or that Dean to ever understand what it means to him, so he’s not exactly keen on sharing.

“He was heterosexual,” Cas says, jaw clenched. “I knew he could never reciprocate my feelings.”

“You said you raised a child together,” Bobby says and his voice is somewhere between skeptical and contemplative.

“We did. For four years.”

“Your son,” Bobby adds.

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Until he died?”

Cas swallows heavily and despite everything, he can feel a stinging in his eyes.

“They died the same day,” Cas whispers.

Bobby and Ellen exchange another glance but Cas is far too tired to try to decipher it. He just wants this conversation to be over.

“How long did you know him?” Ellen says.

“Twelve years,” Cas says.

Ellen leans forward in her seat now, her hands clasped together as if in some mock imitation of prayer. Cas aches.

“Twelve years,” she repeats slowly. “Did you live together?”

“Yes.”

“So you share a home. You raise a child. You fall in love. You spend twelve years together,” Ellen says, enunciating each word carefully. “All that time, you were in love with him?”

“For every minute,” Cas whispers.

“Must’ve been exhausting,” Ellen says softly. “Loving someone that much and never getting it back.”

And Cas doesn’t know where she’s going with this and frankly, he doesn’t care. Because he’s heard every iteration of this from countless different people in his life, and his response will always remain the same.

“You say that as if it exists in a vacuum,” Cas says. “As if sexual and romantic involvement are required for any type of intimacy. I knew him. I memorized the color of his eyes and the cadence of his laugh. I comforted him after the deaths of his family and I drank whiskey with him after we saved a life together. I listened to his favorite music for a chance of hearing it the way he heard it, and I watched his favorite movies for a chance of seeing them the way he saw them.”

Tears fall down his cheeks but Cas doesn’t stop, can’t stop, not until he’s said what he needs to say.

“And I stood by him even when he hated me. Even when he blamed me for things outside of my control. And when I finally walked away—when I couldn’t take it anymore—I still found my way back to him. Because maybe he didn’t reciprocate my feelings, but he was my best friend, and I knew him. I lost my faith in my family. In God. In the way I used to think the world should be. But I knew him, and because of that—I knew myself. Because the only reason I am the way I am is because of him, and the only things I like about myself are things that remind me of him.”

Cas lets out a heavy breath, running a ragged hand through his hair.

“Don’t presume to tell me that I never got anything in return. Loving him was a privilege in and of itself. The women he was with, maybe they knew him sexually—but I knew his very soul. My love for him made him mine. Even if he never actually belonged to me.”

For a long moment, Ellen and Bobby just look at him. Cas can feel a stubborn flush across his cheeks—he hadn’t meant for all that to come out so suddenly. But he’s never appreciated it when someone challenges his feelings for his Dean, regardless of who it is.

“Why are you even asking me this?” Cas says. “What does any of this have to do with my relationship with Dean?”

“We wanted to be sure you were serious about this,” Ellen says. “Because Dean is serious about you. We know you’re a good man, Cas. But the truth is, we don’t know hardly anything about you. You keep your past to yourself and there’s nothing wrong with that. I get it, believe me. But we need something to go on—a reason to believe that you’re not gonna up and disappear on Dean.”

“I’ve known Dean his whole life,” Bobby says slowly. “And I ain’t ever heard him talk about anyone the way he talks about you. If you’re gonna do this with him, no more secrets.”

And this—this is what Cas didn’t have the presence of mind to fear. Because realistically, Cas knew this would happen at some point. They would want to know more, of course they would. But Cas isn’t prepared for it in the way he should be.

“You lived an entire life before you got here, Cas,” Bobby says quietly. “You were right. Dean ain’t a child anymore. But he hasn’t lived like you, either.”

Cas considers this for a moment.

“Perhaps you’re right,” Cas says slowly, making sure to look them both in the eyes as he says it, because this is important. “I know I’ve experienced many things that Dean hasn’t. But I need you to understand—just being with him, just loving him—that’s a new experience for me, too. I don’t want you to think my past relationships somehow discount what I have with Dean, because they don’t. Being in love with someone who loves me back—that’s new for me. I know it’s new for Dean, too. And I’m grateful—that we get to experience that for the first time, together.”

Cas isn’t sure what it is—whether it’s what he said or the way he said it—but it seems to finally get through to them. Bobby and Ellen exchange one more glance, and Ellen nods firmly.

“Okay,” Bobby says. “Here’s the deal, Cas. We’re not gonna interfere with what yer doing with Dean—either of us. But we’re puttin’ a lot of trust in you and that don’t come free. We need somethin’ in return.”

“Information is the most valuable currency there is for hunters,” Ellen says. “Secrets can save lives in this line of work. Can cost ‘em, too. We’ve trusted you with our kids on hunts. This goes beyond that. Now we need to trust you with someone we love very much, in our own home. You can take it at a steady pace but—we’re gonna need to know more.”

“Whatever you want to know, I’ll tell you,” Cas says, and he means it.

“Good,” Ellen says simply. “Now why don’t you go and get some sleep, stranger? You look like hell.”

Cas lets out a breathy laugh.

“I am exhausted,” he admits carefully. “Could we continue this tomorrow?”

Ellen nods.

“Get some rest,” she says, patting him on the shoulder. “Tomorrow’s a new day. I’m surprised you stayed up this long, anyway.”

Cas pushes himself to his feet, fighting furiously against the blush threatening to rush to his face.

“I just—I wanted to make sure Dean slept okay,” Cas says quietly.

Bobby sends him a look at that, arms firmly crossed. But he looks more contemplative than mad.

“That’s certainly a start,” Ellen says, clearly biting back a smile.

Yes, Cas supposes. It really, really is.