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We have
swallowed him up, they said.
It’s beautiful, it really is.
— Snow and Dirty Rain, Richard Siken
It is a sleeping death.
Castiel knows sleep, now, like he knows exhaustion, hunger, pain. Like he knows the warm embrace of an engine rumbling, streetlight caressing leather upholstery, in the dark chassis of the Impala flying down the interstate. He has lived there, left a piece of himself in the backseat, curled up and breathing, listening to the bicker and murmur of voices up front.
He goes willingly into what is familiar, gives himself up into its arms, closes his eyes against the interim. It is dying in that the body understands it to be dying, falling, giving in. It is relief in that the mind knows it to be a kind of freedom, a catharsis, an altar upon which he lays himself to rest. It is nothing but a dusk dark nothingness, a rift torn into the earth, a cavity sucked dry, an endless tormented sleep.
And why shouldn't he go quietly? There is nothing left to say. He said it all already. He closes his eyes on the world that once held him, cuts the grasping reach of his gaze as it seeks to linger, says, let me go.
It ends with a chasm, and him, swallowed. It ends with, don't do this, Cas.
Castiel has never been very good at following orders.
He goes willingly, smiling, and his face is wet with tears, and his chest is bursting with a bleeding, pounding warmth that's too large to hold. There is no way to stop it, what he must do, what spills out into the air like prayer, like absolution, like reverence. He closes his eyes on the world, on the beautiful world that held him, and he says goodbye to everything he's ever wanted.
Goodbye, Dean.
The afterimage burns itself into his eyelids, into his soul, long after there is nothing. In the dark maw of the Empty, he is lost in an expanse of space, and still, he sees it, with eyes that have no light with which to see.
He sees the stubborn heat beneath his palm, pushing, denying, digging in its heels. Thrown aside, just as it was gripped tightly and raised from perdition, now shoved down, away, for the ground to catch safely. He sees the mark he left, the stain of blood soaking into fabric fibers, its tendrils clawing deep and clinging, holding, like the trail of outstretched fingers through the air.
Let go, he said, to himself, to the warm body resisting separation, to the tangle of eyes caught on each other, shining with the burn and sting of goodbye.
It is him who pushed Dean away. Who let go and fell back and closed his eyes on the world, and said, goodbye. But it is also him who still holds on, who burns that afterimage into his eyelids, aching to see just one more time. The strike of grief and horror, the furious desperation of a torn breath, an open mouth, the gentling softness of his eyes as he looked, and listened, and traced every inch of him in return. Seeing, seeing him, swallowed. Feeling the last heat of him seep away from a handprint made in blood on his shoulder.
Happiness is a strange thing. It hurts to hold. Like a hot, searing ember, sinking its teeth into the palm of his hand. Still, he holds it. He doesn't know how to let go. It's enough to feel it, that sweet ache, just as it was enough to speak it out into the world, give it life, give it memory. Just like that, it became real, separate from him, torn free from his burning chest as though escaping a burning building, and he did not have to know where it went.
Except that, in this lacuna of time and space, in its stretching darkness, he feels it still, just a flaming, flickering ember, stoked deep inside of him, and he knows it can never escape. Sleep, he thinks, is another kind of death. A floating, weightless eternity, with no handholds to grasp, no fibers to soak with his blood, no leather to press his warm cheek into. It is restless, this waiting, and it will never end.
I wanted this. His little fire burns on, at his center, a sun to orbit. I wanted nonexistence so that he might carry on existing. That is enough.
And it is. He is changed, irrevocably, torn apart and built anew, and the growing pains are pinpricks now, nothing in the face of the burgeoning thing too large to hold. Here, he has nothing else to hold onto. He is painfully, doggedly conscious; it does not allow him to rest. He falls through his own mind, endlessly, tumbling into cavity after cavity, remembering, seeing, listening.
The rumble of the Impala's engine. Music blasted from the radio and sung along to, windows down. Heat spread over his stone body, wrapped around his shoulders, buried in his hair. Hands clapping him on the back, brushing against his elbow, ruffling his hair. Laughter ringing brightly in his ears. Dark, shifting shadows on the curtains of motel rooms, moving, interchangeable, always the same. Quiet, sleeping forms, shapeless, on soft pillowed beds, their chests rising and falling with each breath. TV flashing with coloured pictures and foreign jokes, undercut by a quiet, helpful running commentary from the other end of the sofa. The rough rasp of stone and brick against scraped knuckles, the heat of a body shoved against a wall, breaths snarled and heart thrashing. A gentle, moonlight glow bleeding into rain damp asphalt, glittering in dark eyes, the anchored weight of waiting feet and the wash of relief when the wait is over. Blood and sweat and grit washing away, violence cleansed, pure and light, as his hand cradles the soft cheek of a trusting face, knelt in supplication. Lights sparking and bursting as their fuses blow, shattered, wind howling, a knife sinking smooth gratitude into the willing flesh of a body that isn't yet his.
It is not even a lifetime. But it is stretched to last, to replay, over and over and over again, a kindling kept burning by his warm, tight grip. Castiel remembers, and he aches for it, but he knows this time, the wait is truly endless. Memories or torment; they are one and the same.
This is all he will ever have, and it is happiness.
“Cas!”
This voice is a thing of memories. Castiel knows it well by now. He listens, and he cradles, and he aches. He says nothing, because it cannot hear him, not anymore. It is an echo of a conversation long since past, one where he might have answered, might have called out, lips moving around a warm, vibratory sound. But now, he can only listen.
If he followed it, followed that echoing voice, that glimpse of faraway warmth, he would find nothing. There is a kind of peace in not knowing. In imagining that it leads somewhere else.
“Cas, you're gonna have to help me out, man. We aren't made with built-in headlights, you know?”
Castiel finds this dialogue bizarre. He has never heard it say these things, before, real or fabricated, and he can't guess its purpose. To lure him, strangely, into wandering the dark beyond? Into searching for another blind, stumbling body?
“C'mon. Just say something. Cas, please.”
Suddenly, he cannot bear to hear it, and he cannot turn away. He curls up inside himself, crumbling, wounded, at the soft, tremulous desperation in that voice. That familiar voice. He is starved, gasping, aching for it to strike into him with terrible misery. He would take anything at all, over nothing.
“Cas,” Dean says, weakly, hoarsely, impossibly close.
He can't bear it. “Dean?”
There is a brilliant flare of light, white hot, that shivers at the sound of him and burns the fringes of his being. Castiel staggers as he blinks away from it, then goes still, blinking. He can blink. He can see. He can flinch his eyes shut. His voice is warm and rumbling where it dies in his throat, his flesh and blood throat, and he draws a long, rasping breath in like it is the first he has ever taken. All at once, a rebirth. An awakening.
Footsteps, stumbling towards him, echoing splashes of weight disturbing pools of shallow water. His chest, rising as he breathes. His eyes wide open.
“Cas! You're— are you here?”
“Yes,” Castiel says, realising that he is.
“Keep talking,” Dean says, voice thick with relief. “Just— hang on, and I'll find you. Okay?”
“Are you real?” Castiel asks, hardly daring to hope.
“Yeah. Yeah, I'm real. I'm tryna get you out.”
“No, that's not possible,” he whispers.
“Well, shit,” Dean laughs, shaky and tight. “Guess I'll just go home. I'm not allowed to save your ass?”
Maybe it's the absolute absence of sweet reassurances, of hurried, urging tones and hands tugging on him. This feels different than before. Castiel knows it isn't possible, but he also knows that nothing short of a perfect mimicry could fabricate Dean like this, with his laughter rendered in exact frequency and his low, self-deprecating sarcasm, seeped in affection.
There is no determined push back, no, it is real, Cas. There is no collapsing fold of cards, laughing coldly, yeah, you got me. It's just a trick. Why would I come and save you? The Empty would not pass up these opportunities, if Castiel were so stupid as to give them again, as he did before. There is only a raw, ordinary authenticity, so jarringly out of place.
“Not gonna ask me to stay?” Dean says, sharp with something strained and bitter.
“I couldn't ask that of you,” Castiel murmurs.
“Yeah, well, maybe I want you to.”
Silence falls like a gentle surrender. Castiel can't bring himself to deny it, to deny Dean anything, and yet he cannot heave the words out of his mouth to ask. In the dark like this, he almost floats away with it, itching with the urge to disappear in a flutter of oil-black feathers. Escape this cruelty. He is still unsure, teetering on the edge of a breathless fall. It simply can't be real.
“You think I came all this way just to leave you behind?” Dean asks, raw with sincerity. “Where are you, Cas?”
Castiel realises that he is in a place. Not floating, not remembering, not sinking. He is standing in a dark, cavernous lacuna, water rippling beneath his feet. He is wearing what he was wearing when he died. The trenchcoat is such a displaced memory that he nearly weeps to see it again.
“Dean,” Castiel calls out, trembling, into the dark. “I'm here.”
He waits. It is no longer endless. His eyes are wide open, watching, waiting, searching, and they pick apart the darkness in a strain until a flicker of roving light comes close enough to see. It bounds closer and closer, taking on an indistinct, wispy form. A soul.
From deep within the warm light, Dean's voice resonates, relieved. “Cas. I can see you.”
“Dean.” Castiel loses all grasp on words, heart fluttering madly.
“You gotta hold onto me.” The vague light reaches, like an arm stretching to hold, and a warm spark of humour shines. “You raised me, once. Now I get to return the favour. Sound good?”
It sounds impossible. But Castiel reaches out anyway, without fear of burning up, and grasps the heated outline of a palm, calloused and firm. It might not be Dean that he sees, but it is Dean's hand that he can feel. Dean's radiant soul that flares under his touch. He would know it anywhere; it cannot be fabricated.
“Let's go home, Cas,” Dean says, and pulls.
I made
this place for you. A place for you to love me.
If this isn’t the kingdom then I don’t know what is.
— Snow and Dirty Rain, Richard Siken
The Bunker is just as he remembers it.
Alive. It is alive with heat and movement and sound. For so long, all he had were memories— now that they're real, living, breathing, Castiel feels like he's existing on the wrong frequency. Unsteady. Discordant. A piece when he should be a spectator.
An excited clamour reaches his ears first, worried shouts and rapid Latin. Then a blur of light and colour. His knees, solid and tender, hit the floor with bruising force as the darkness spits them out. He crumples, suddenly feeling the heavy weight of every limb, and hands surge up to grip his shoulders, bearing him against another body for support.
“Easy, Cas,” Dean says, quiet and close, a murmur in his ear. His breath stirs the hair by Castiel's neck like a warm summer breeze.
“Dean,” Castiel whispers.
Dean holds him tighter. For a moment, it's as though he is all that's holding him together in one piece. Castiel feels fragmented, split in a thousand different directions, overwhelmed by the richness of his surroundings. He was blind— no, deprived of all senses, and now they have returned to him tenfold. He is adrift in an ocean of warmth, and he is home.
“You gonna let the rest of us have a piece?” Sam laughs tearfully.
Over Dean's shoulder, Castiel blinks in quick succession and the blurry shape of Sam comes into focus. There is no strength in his newly born body to move, but Sam moves for him, resting a warm hand on his shoulder and shaking it. He smiles, tears tripping and rolling down his cheeks, and Castiel drinks it all in with such gratitude he feels sick.
“Good to have you back, Cas,” Sam says. “We missed you.”
“Sam,” Castiel says, voice thick in his throat.
Dean gives him a hard squeeze, burying his face into his neck. Still, they don't separate. Castiel gives himself over to it, wholly; he sinks into the embrace without a thought. His weight must be significant, but Dean simply holds him up, fingers digging deep into his coat and scrunching the material up.
A wave of nauseating exhaustion rocks through him. Castiel lists sideways, hands falling slack where they'd been clinging to Dean, and immediately Dean pulls back to scan him with concern.
“Cas? What's wrong?” Dean asks frantically, green eyes flickering.
Castiel stares at him, just to see. Just to savour it. Every soft scattered freckle, every white line of scar tissue. The raw redness around his eyes, glimmering in the light, black pupils wavering. The smooth cut of his jaw, his cheekbones, his nose. His furrowed brow, his wet lashes. Such painstaking detail. Never in his memories was Dean this clear.
Wrong. How could anything about this moment be wrong? If there is a holy kingdom, it is here. In this room, with these people.
“I'm…” Castiel mumbles, dark spots floating across Dean's face. “I'm… tired, I think.”
A startled laugh spills from Dean's lips, rough and shaky. His hand rises to cup Castiel's cheek, holding his head steady. “Yeah, yeah me too.”
“He should lie down,” Sam says, still clutching Castiel's shoulder like a lifeline.
“Sorry,” Castiel says, breathing out long and slow. His eyelids droop and he leans into Dean's touch, vision blurring. A gentle thumb smooths circles over his cheekbone, tracing over and over.
This time when he falls asleep, he knows it won't be endless.
When Castiel wakes, the room is awash with soft blue light. Not dark, but palatably dim, everything underwater.
It's a novelty to wake up in a room. To be more than a floating chain of parts, scattered through time. To still feel heavy and tired. He stirs slowly, groggily, not yet used to such human functions, though he should be, and not quite believing his fortune. He is, against all odds, home.
The thick curl of doubt tightens around Castiel's chest, fingers twitching against the bedsheets.
Illusory images are not outside of the Empty's capabilities. It would be just like him, to want to be saved. To want to believe wholeheartedly in bare-faced luck and kindness, only for it to be ripped away. At any moment now, he feels it could all darken, swept under in a crushing tidal wave, leaving— nothing. Oblivion.
His cheek is creased and pink from its press to the pillow. He touches the softness of the brushed cotton, smoothing his fingertips over it. He touches his own face, the creases, the lingering warmth. There is a certain undeniability to the flesh and blood of his own existence. Tactile. Textured. Real. Every sensation is so heightened with richness as to feel surreal.
The bed he has no memory of lying down in is a soft expanse of plush cotton. It is his bed. His room in the Bunker. It simply has to be real, not because he can put his faith in it, but because he can't bear the alternative.
Castiel pushes his hands into the gentle give of the mattress and sits up. His head rushes with blood at the movement, dark spots dancing.
He's alone in the room, and this thought should not be so discomforting as it is. He has been alone for a long time. It's familiar, in the way of cold, encroaching dread. The room is blue, not wholly dark. But it is just close enough to unnerve. His throat works dryly as he swallows sleep-stale saliva. His bare feet brush the carpet floor, grazing slight bristles. He tries to latch onto these things, the beating of his heart, the quickening of his breath—
“Lay off it, Sammy,” Dean's voice comes, faintly, from the other side of the door, tight and churlish. “I'm just checkin’ on him.”
“Yeah, for like, the fifth time,” Sam answers, farther away.
“Yeah, well, what if he wakes up? And— and freaks out, or something, does a vanishing act.”
“He wouldn't just leave us like that. He just got back.”
Castiel digs his fingers into the mattress, curls them deep like teeth, like anchors. His heart thuds in his chest. Those voices sound real, sound familiar like sliding into the backseat and hearing the engine turn over. He is starved for it, for these ordinary exchanges, not torn from a stale past but unfurling before him, new and sweet like spring flowers.
Is he capable of a ‘vanishing act’? The thought hadn't crossed his mind. He shies away from the implication, a nervous tremor rising like sickness through his sternum. Maybe it's the expectation that he will go, will leave them— the thought that Dean might prefer it that way, more familiar with avoidance than someone who stays.
If he could, Castiel would never live another day being dishonest. He tasted that freedom in the blink of an eye, and he regretted none of it. He would tell Dean, everyday, forever, if he thought Dean would listen; would stomach hearing it.
For the first time since coming home, Castiel searches within himself. He listens to his heartbeat, pulsing strong in his ears. His mouth is dry, lips corrugated where his tongue traces the indents. As he shifts, his wrinkled dress shirt crumples in odd lines across his chest, his arms, too confining. His collar is unbuttoned; the firm material brushes his chin as he cants his head to the side, turned up in a dogear. Within, there is a silence.
It would be wrong to say he feels empty, or bereft of some essential limb. Castiel has experienced this loss before— it has been dragged out of him, messy and bleeding, hitting snags on the ground as it kept clinging and clinging, until it finally rested. He listens to the faint murmur of voices through the door, and he finds himself forgetting what he's missing. All of it, all that he needs, is right here. He fell in love with humanity, and he wants to be a part of it, a small cog in the marvellous machine of creation.
He wants to stay. He wants it so badly it hurts where it tears through him, a sudden, horrible longing. It should not be possible, but he is home. All of it, within reach again. Fragile and tender and wonderfully familiar. If they will have him, he wants to stay. If he has a place in the puzzle here.
“I'm just checkin’,” Dean says again, quietly. Closing the still going argument. His low voice rasps, hangs heavy in the air, temptingly tangible.
Castiel sits up straighter, eyes fixed on the closed door like he can reach through it and feel. Soak in every syllable, every breath taken in and softly given out. His hearing is sharp— sharp enough to hear how Dean hesitates at the threshold. Close, but not quite entering.
The door gives way with a soft drag against the carpet. Light pours into the room, a seeping cut of white that stops just before it intersects with Castiel's dangling legs.
It's a practised movement, the way Dean balances the door ajar, so as not to let the stream of light fall on the bed. He doesn't release the handle. He nudges one foot in the gap, ducking his head inside. His eyes, keen and searching anxiously, blink to adjust to the darkness. Momentarily unseeing. Then a furrow—
“Cas,” Dean says with relief, seeing him. “You're up.”
Castiel deftly handles the punching surge of fondness that comes over him, constricting his chest and throat. It is a feeling too large for this body to house. His stomach twists with the phenomena known as ‘butterflies’. He is struck by such a simple thing, by the routine way Dean must have checked on him, over and over, each time taking care not to wake him with the intruding light.
“Hello, Dean,” Castiel says. His voice comes out thick and rough with sleep.
Dean holds the door open a little further. Just enough to let him step inside, still with a hand on the frame. He must have adjusted to the change in light, because he studies Castiel with a growing smile and then he huffs a pleased laugh.
“Sleep well? Your hair's a goddamn mess.”
It hadn't occurred to Castiel to check. One of those social mannerisms that never quite stuck. His hand travels up to brush through his hair, which does feel rather tousled in a way that's beyond help. He sighs. It's soft, detangling beneath his dragging fingers, the motion inordinately soothing.
“Not really helping, buddy,” Dean says dryly.
“It is what you would call ‘bedhead’,” Castiel replies.
After this exchange, Dean seems to feel more welcome. He comes into the room, allowing the door to slip shut behind him and bathe them in almost-darkness again. In the quiet, their breathing is loud for being so gentle.
“Need a light on in here,” Dean mutters beneath his breath, crossing the floor to the desk. “Couldn't find the lamp? You got night vision now or something?”
“No,” Castiel answers, watching, picking out Dean's features in the dark. The slope of his shoulders, the stretch of his hand as he flicks the lamp on.
A golden, dewy glow seeps across the room. It conquers Dean first, lighting along his shape in the way a setting sun burns the silhouette of skyline spires. He approaches faster than Castiel can keep up with, drinking in his presence with feverish abandon. He comes to a stop by the bed, and then his hand, warm and calloused, is descending into Castiel's hair.
Castiel softens, leans into the touch, unthinking. He feels, for a moment, Dean's hand stiffen in its path, before it buries itself further. The action reminds him of wild animals, preening and grooming each other in reconciliation. A gentle, sweeping caress through disorderly strands. A rough tousle to balance it out, more affectionate than fixing.
“I don't believe you're helping,” Castiel murmurs in jest. It grazes coarse like sandpaper on the way out.
At his words, Dean retracts his hand, dropping it at his side. The loss of it makes Castiel lean closer, seeking, but he stops himself before he can catch Dean by the wrist. He knows he cannot cross that invisible boundary; he knows intimately what he cannot have. There's comfort in that familiarity.
“Um,” Dean clears his throat, shifting where he stands, eyes flickering back and away again. “How're you feeling? You hungry? Thirsty?”
The sensations need, for once, very little deciphering. Castiel nods, wondering if perhaps Dean will make them food. Breakfast, possibly, depending on what time of day it is, and how long he slept for.
“Cool. I, um, I can put on some bacon,” Dean goes on, now drumming his fingers on his thigh. “Eggs, all that stuff. Whatever you like. You should probably stay put, you seemed pretty drained before.”
It was akin to rising from the dead. Testing his strength now, Castiel rises to his feet, stretching his calves and rolling his shoulders slowly. He feels momentarily lightheaded, but it passes. His limbs hum with a faint charge as they awaken. His head is muggy and sleepy, eyes warm with a slight itch.
“I feel better,” Castiel reports. He brings a hand up to rub at his eyes, and bumps Dean's chest with his elbow. Only then does he realise how close they're standing.
Still, Dean doesn't move away.
“That's good.” Dean breathes in and out heavily. Brushes Castiel's side with his hand as he moves. “You're… all mojo-ed up?”
“No.” Castiel tenses, hesitating. “I believe I am… fully human again.”
“Good,” Dean says again.
It dawns upon Castiel to wonder what Dean is thinking. What thoughts are floating through his distant mind, fretful over his waking, careful in his handling, aware of their proximity. Why it is ‘good’ that he is human again, simple as that. He is lesser now, without a purpose, no use to them, so fragile and feeling, but Dean has not mentioned any of it. Only a gladness that they are, on some level, the same. Connected.
Mostly Castiel wonders if Dean remembers all that he said, before the Empty took him. It was not a conversation he expected to revisit. This makes itself glaringly, uncomfortably apparent.
“May I use the shower?” Castiel asks.
“Oh. Yeah, sure, of course,” Dean stumbles over his words, backing up to the door. “Yeah, you're probably— you probably wanna wash all the Empty gunk off. I'll get you somethin’ to change into.”
Castiel doesn't get the chance to question this supposed ‘gunk’ before Dean is leaving the room, the door cracked open behind him. He should have asked, too, the more important question of how exactly they brought him back, but seeing Dean again eclipsed all else. Simultaneously too much and too little.
His clothes had also escaped his attention, clean as they are. Somebody has removed his trenchcoat and tie, leaving him in just the dress shirt and slacks, now creased and crumpled from sleeping in them. It warms something inside of him, to know that he was so thoughtfully tended to after he lost consciousness. The Winchester brothers possess such unrelenting kindness. That his comfort should be considered is such a small thing, but it's very inexplicably human.
Even now, Dean is caring for him, in any way that he can. Offering food, and clothing. Castiel gathers up these little pieces close to his chest with relish.
It's strange, being human enough to feel fatigue. Castiel rediscovers minor irritants as he traverses to the bathroom, unsteady and weighed down by his own sluggish limbs. The light of the hallway burns in his slow blinking eyes, which he rubs again.
However, he discovers that it is extremely pleasant being human enough to stand under the shower spray and feel the heat of it drum down on his aching shoulder blades. He surrenders under it with a sigh of happiness.
There's a light knock on the door just as Castiel is emerging from the steam. He lifts his face from where he'd been burying it in the soft pillow of his towel and looks towards it in question.
“Cas? I brought you some clothes. I'll just leave them here,” Dean's voice calls.
In the time it takes for Castiel to open the door, the hallway is empty again. He retrieves the pile of clothing with great interest, recognising the casual shirt as one of Dean's. More kindness, freely given. Albeit thrown at him with a hasty retreat, as anything tender often is coming from Dean Winchester.
To tell the truth, Castiel is quite surprised by Dean's acceptance of him into their home again. After what he said. He would have thought Dean would withdraw much further, his trust in him twisted, alarmed at even brotherly affection. But perhaps it's enough just to ignore it entirely.
He knows better than to wish Dean would accept being loved. He wishes anyway.
It worries him that Dean might refuse it, might deny it of him, because Castiel knows he cannot stop loving him anymore than he can stop the turn of the earth. If he can be allowed this much, just loving him, quietly, it will be a miracle.
As he enters the kitchen, the warm, tempting aroma of sizzling bacon reaches him, and Castiel breathes in deeply. His stomach aches in hunger, at once a familiar and unfamiliar creature.
“Morning, Cas. Looking cosy,” Sam greets, raising an amused eyebrow.
Castiel looks down to consider his attire. Water trickles coolly down his neck at the motion from his still wet hair, damp and curling. He only wore what Dean left for him. Sweatpants and a loose t-shirt, with a graphic and faded lettering that reads AC/DC.
From where he's flipping bacon at the stove, Dean turns his head just enough to look him over. Something like amusement flashes across his face, his gaze softening. His eyes flicker to meet Castiel's for a brief moment, then relocate to the bacon.
Castiel tilts his head to Sam. “Is it not appropriate?”
“No, it's fine,” Sam reassures him, shovelling down his eggs. “Just used to seeing you all dressed up. Must feel nice to get out of that suit.”
Considering this, Castiel finds that it does. He feels warm and comfortable, swathed in heat from the shower and the subtle, clean scent of soap. His body feels more pliant, so freed of tension. It's been a while since he felt truly restful.
Plus, that the clothing is a gift from Dean makes it all the more appreciated.
“I am enjoying being human,” Castiel says, and savours the responding warmth of Sam's smile.
While he eats, they explain the grounds of their rescue plan for him. How Jack had used his newfound status to make an exception for him, opening up a gateway to the Empty and sending Dean's soul inside. Sam says that Dean wouldn't let anyone else do it. Dean claims Sam to have a galling lack of competency that couldn't be risked. Apparently Jack has his hands full right now, but he wants to check in and say hi to Castiel later. Castiel hopes he can feel the pang of fondness he sends in prayer to him.
“I recognised your soul when it came to me,” Castiel says, regarding Dean as the man fidgets with his glass. “It was as radiant as the day I met you.”
“Jeez, Cas, way to make a guy blush,” Dean laughs, avoiding his eyes.
Castiel takes in the deflection, turning it over at all angles. There is a charge in the air between them, one of mutual knowing, that lingers unspoken of. It is clear that Dean does remember, but that Sam is unaware. Whether it's the company or pure discomfort, Dean doesn't want to listen. Doesn't want to hear gentle things.
“I thought it might reassure you to know that you are the same. Unmarred by all the trials you faced over the years,” Castiel goes on, like the pause never happened. “Still…” beautiful. “Bright with kindness. Still Dean Winchester.”
He'd thought as much before he died. The feeling never quite left him. Hanging as though on a great precipice, unable to uncurl his fingers and let go. A part of him is still in that basement, memorising every line of Dean's grief-stricken face, just to keep something in a place where nothing else existed. He'd replayed it, over and over, those last vital moments. They echo unbidden in the halls of his mind now.
“That's not true,” Dean says, blinking rapidly at the table now. “If there's anyone who knows how screwed in the head I am by now, it's you.”
“I know,” Castiel answers, because knowing that doesn't make it any less true.
“I'm really glad you're home, Cas,” Sam says, hesitating to intrude on their exchange. “Somebody has to talk some sense into him.”
There is room left for Dean to protest, to rib back at his brother as they often do, but Dean is uncharacteristically silent. He tips back his water instead, and sets the glass back on the table with a little too much force.
Sam looks to Castiel like he has an answer. “So. You're… human again? Fully?”
“Yes.”
“Do you think it'll be permanent?” Sam's eyes flicker briefly towards Dean's wall of silence.
“Yes, I…” Castiel traces the cool condensation of his glass with his pinky finger. “I think I left it behind, when I left the Empty. I would like— I would like to stay, if I can.”
“Cas, of course you can,” Sam says, earnest as he leans onto the table to meet his eyes. “This is your home. It always has been. Right, Dean?”
This is it. The moment the barrier crumbles, and it all comes crashing down, washing him away. If Dean does not want him here, Castiel will not stay. Expectation is different from true desire, but all the same, Dean's first thought of him was one of a swift escape. A flutter of phantom wings and a gaping absence left behind.
Perhaps, deep down, it is what Dean would prefer from him. Miles of distance between them rather than one kitchen table. Perhaps it would be easier to breathe.
“Yeah,” Dean says. He looks up then, and they stare into each other's eyes. “Unless you've got somewhere better to be.”
Castiel studies the rings of honeyed green in those eyes and wonders what they see when they look at him. Surely, it must all be broken and spilled across his face, terrible streaks of ruin, of desire. He knows no better how to hide it than how to feel it at all. For all his lessons in humanity, he has never been able to grasp the intricacies of concealment. This study that Dean has perfected to an art. The rough scrape of a joke against an open wound; the thump of a hand on a back when he would rather melt into an embrace and never resurface.
“There is nowhere I would rather be than here,” Castiel answers, and it has nothing to do with the surrounding walls.
A flicker of deeply buried worry passes over Dean's face. It examines Castiel for honesty, and then it settles, toughened with resolve. With the need to believe his words. He nods, and it's settled.
When Dean stands and gathers the dishes to wash, Castiel joins him. He tidies his own place at the table, clears away any evidence of disturbance. He watches the soap bubble, shining iridescent, over Dean's fingers, feels the heat of the plates as they're passed to him for drying and imagines its source is close enough to touch. A facsimile of what he truly wants.
There is a certain unrest to the man beside him. Dean has always been a well-oiled machine in motion, barreling through life's grievances and churning them up. Faced with sudden inertia, the apocalypse behind them, he doesn't seem to know how to stop.
Every drum of his fingers, every mechanical pass of the sponge over a too-clean plate, every quick exit from a conversation gone too idle, too tender— Dean is running away from his life, like it's nipping at his heels.
As soon as Dean steps away, muttering, “Gonna go get some groceries, we're down to nothing but Bud Lights,” Castiel rests a hand on his arm.
“I'll come with you.”
Dean averts his gaze. “You don't have to—”
“I want to get outside again,” Castiel says quietly. His fingers twitch where they wrap around firm heat, desperate to grip tighter. “I've missed it. Sunlight. People.”
At this, Dean turns a full volta. He looks at him, suddenly, intensely, with a deep scrutiny. There is a tight, bruised pain to him as though the words have pressed down hard onto a tender spot he'd thought was hidden. His brow draws inwards; he braces as though for a blow.
“Have fun,” Sam says, sidling around them to put a plate back in the cupboard. “You deserve it, Cas. Don't forget the milk this time.”
“I didn't forget,” Dean grouses. The expression is swept away as he steps back, Castiel's hand falling. “You didn't say we needed any and I'm not a goddamn mindreader.”
“Well, I'm saying it now so you'll know.”
“Go to hell, Sammy.”
“Been there, done that, zero out of ten.”
“I'm leaving. Cas, let's go.”
The Impala's engine purrs to life, humming through the seats like a beast risen from deep slumber. Heat blasts from the vents on the console and tickles the hair curling around Castiel's ear. It eats away at the fogged up windows, clearing the damp chill.
Castiel leans back into his seat and closes his eyes. He takes in a deep breath— aged leather upholstery, pine wood, and the faintly sweet metallic of gun oil— and lets it gust out of him with contentment.
“Sounds like you missed Baby more than me,” Dean grunts, resting an arm on the wheel as he reverses out.
“I missed you both equally,” Castiel says, just to make Dean laugh, and smiles when the gruff sound of it fills the car.
They drive in a warm, sleep-mellow silence for a few minutes. Castiel loses himself in the comfort of the car's interior, as much a home to him as the Bunker itself, and in the heat of Dean's closeness. He has many memories here, but he drifts though none of them now. He has the present, and it is more than he could ask for.
While they drive, Castiel watches the world rush by through his window. Deep foliage blurring green until it becomes more scarce, opening into rolling hills and a wide maw of countryside. Fields of wheat and corn stretch endlessly, gleaming in the morning sunlight. Small birds twirl and dive in the distance, beating their wings against the blue.
It's the birds that Castiel watches the longest. Their free-spiraling dance through the air, wind ruffling ink blotch feathers.
He misses flying in the way humans miss childhood. Safe in memory, in an implicit lack of responsibility, in the idea that someone else took care of everything. The person that he was then was barely even a person— a hazy figment of identity, impossible to recognise. He burned, and he lost, and he grew up. Learned the truth. It's a beautiful freedom, even with his feet on the ground.
Now, the closest imitation is the way the Impala soars down the road, tearing up ground so smoothly it seems to glide.
“I miss flying,” Castiel says, just to say it. Just to share it. Before Dean can answer, he rolls his window down and dangles his hand outside. Wind whistles between his spread fingers, trailing through the air like minnows in water.
He can feel Dean stealing glances over at him, and he thinks he should tell him to keep his eyes on the road. But it's a straight shot to the finish line, a path between two hills, and he aches to be seen. To be caressed by sight, touched so indirectly, bending the light where it crashes and foams against his edges. To be made real by being witnessed.
Faintly, over the roar of the wind billowing through the window's sliver, there's the click and whirr of the cassette deck.
A gentle acoustic riff plays the opening of a song Castiel knows. Over the Hills and Far Away by Led Zeppelin is a favourite of Dean's on long car journeys.
Hey lady, you got the love I need
Maybe more than enough
Oh darling, darling, darling, walk a while with me
Oh, you've got so much
So much, so much
The drums kick in with a bone-deep deep rhythm, and the music surges in a bright, shimmering wave. Electric guitar slices through the air, strumming his very being. Golden, hopeful, restless.
Many have I loved
And many times been bitten
Many times I've gazed
Along the open road
Along the top of the steering wheel, Dean's fingertips tap out the beat as easy as breathing. Castiel curls his wind-chilled hand inward, squeezing tight, with a growing balloon of joy inside his chest. He watches Dean now, and how the hard lines of his shoulders loosen, his lips mouthing along to the words.
Many dreams come true
And some have silver linings
That the song is about love is just a coincidence. But Castiel still savours the sound, and when Dean glances over to see him bobbing his head to it, the smile in his eyes is blinding.
“How about this?”
Dean looks over his shoulder at the box of cereal Castiel is holding. The supermarket fluorescents glare down on him like spotlights, bringing every iota of his face into focus. His eyes are shadowed by a great weight, but his shoulders are relaxed.
“It's not on the list,” Dean says, but he takes it and drops it into the basket.
There is a glut of choices lining the shelves. Vibrant, artificial colours and bold lettering. Passersby swerve around them in streams like schools of fish following a current. Castiel anchors himself to Dean's side so as not to be swept away. It is also loud, overwhelmingly so. Children squealing, their shoes catching against the linoleum. Voices overlapping as they debate choices just like them. Tills beeping with the incessant scanning of items that Castiel knows well.
Castiel remains blissfully unaware of the list. Too warm. An itch under his skin. He does not think he can handle any serious thought. They have stepped into an alien world, of sliding doors— he'd forgotten about those, how they sense presence and sweep open to admit it like gate sentinels— and a rush of noise like a tidal wave.
It is an integral part of being human, shopping for groceries. But Castiel is not very good at it. He tries to ease into the crowd, imagining it a natural, seamless movement, but it jars him still.
“It is very loud,” Castiel says stiffly.
The basket hanging over Dean's arm collides with a ladder of foil packets. He curses and tries to catch them, fumbling some to the ground where Castiel retrieves them. As he's fixing the display, Dean glances over to him in question.
“This is the bigger place, so it's busier, yeah. We needed a full shop,” Dean says, then hesitantly, “You good?”
“I am unused to so much…” Castiel trails off, taking in the entire aisle, watching a child hanging off its mother's arm jump up and down with every step. “Everything. There was a certain kind of deprivation in the Empty, like being underwater.”
The conversation seems to stop there. They walk down another length of shelves, picking up produce as they go, and come into the freezer aisle. Cold air raises goosebumps on Castiel's skin, sharp and fresh like a biting breeze. Dean opens a door and suddenly, quietly, speaks from behind its frosted glass,
“Like being asleep?”
In that moment, Castiel understands that the truth will not be kinder. But he owes it to Dean to be honest. “No. It wouldn't allow me that luxury. It was… memories, for the most part.”
Dean's fingers grip the edge of the freezer door tight. He swings it closed with a thump, and throws his findings into the basket. Although Castiel never once looks away from him, Dean manages to keep his gaze steadfastly away. On the linoleum floor, on the aisle ahead, on the moving crowd.
“I don't regret it,” Castiel says, keeping his voice low and gentle.
“Not here,” Dean grits out, shortly.
It's easy enough to obey. Castiel is dizzied by the rich feedback to his senses, and hardly capable of concealing the longing in his eyes. This isn't an ideal time. He swallows down the words he wants to say, burns with temptation, and browses the warm sunset array of mandarins netted in red bags.
“Sam wanted milk,” Castiel reminds Dean, as they pass the fridges, and Dean picks it up without a word.
But, as it turns out, when Dean says, not here, what he means is, not anywhere. They cross the carpark, hands full with plastic bags, and Castiel burrows into the warm jacket Dean lent him, buffeted by strong winds. Silence stretches thinly between them, like taut white plastic straining against the weight of several tonnes of groceries. He knows not to test its strength.
Castiel wakes in the dark. He breathes in and out, slowly, his entire body held still like a drawn bow. His legs are caught in a warm tangle of blankets; his borrowed shirt smells like Dean's car.
It's hard to unlearn one thing, when it used to be true. He finds it difficult to trust even himself. There are moments, many moments, where he questions whether he is dreaming. Which is the dream and which is the waking world. Tonight, he does not remember dreaming of anything— nor understand why he woke.
A creak from outside of his room echoes in the quiet.
Castiel's eyes adjust to the darkness, and he realises it is not absolute. Faint shadows play across the walls, thrown by a sliver of light. The door held ajar.
He doesn't move, though he wants to. Wants to turn over and rest his eyes on Dean's haggard shape, ask him to come closer. He doesn't want to face down a brick wall and beg it for closeness. It gnaws at him, this aching curiosity, wondering why Dean is up keeping a nightly vigil. What he expects to find when he opens the door.
The door shuts with a gentle click. Pitch black night descends over the room, and Castiel's heart jumps into his throat.
He's out of bed before his mind can catch up, shivering at the loss of his warm cocoon. In the hallway, a soft light burns in the distance from the living area. Castiel moves towards it with some vague notion of touching it, of feeling its realness, like a moth drawn to an artificial bulb.
On the sofa, Dean is sitting with his head tipped back against the cushion, an arm flung over his face. The lamplight warms his bare skin golden.
He lowers his arm as he feels Castiel standing over him. Heaves out a shaky breath. “Cas. Shit, sorry, did I wake you up?”
“No,” Castiel lies, like it will smooth down all of Dean's rough edges. “I was already awake. It was too dark.”
Living underground makes him feel a little like he's been buried alive, sometimes. Boxed into a casket and lowered into earth, warm and dark and breathing. It helped to go outside today, to feel the wind against his skin as the Impala flew past the countryside. He sat outside for a while when they came home, breathing in the pine resin and damp soil, listening to the tree canopies rustle.
Castiel watches as Dean looks away. Ducks his head to hide the wet sheen of his tired eyes. There is a distance to them, a hollow vacancy, like he's disappearing behind them, collapsing into himself like rotten wood.
Their silence is a blanket, soft and heavy. It seems this is another anywhere where Dean doesn't want to talk. Castiel sits down beside him instead, arms brushing, and lets his eyes slip shut.
There is a gentle shift of movement, nudging at Castiel's shoulder, and then the sound of the TV fills the room in a quiet static stream. The volume is just low enough to allow voices to murmur, indecipherable. It's a soothing noise, periphery. It eats away at the absoluteness of the dark behind Castiel's eyelids, humming a mantra of home, home, home.
“I'm so mad at you,” Dean whispers. He takes in a thick, hitching breath, swallows. The heat of his arm presses into Castiel's like a brand.
Castiel keeps his eyes closed through the sharp pang in his chest. “For what I said.”
“For leaving.”
It spills from him, tumbles in a violent cascade, like he can't get it out fast enough. Dean handles gentle, honest things like hot coals. This admission burns Castiel too. He opens his eyes to stare blankly at the sitcom on the TV, mouth dry and heartbeat stumbling.
“I don't regret it,” Castiel says again.
Dean chokes out a weak, flat laugh. “You should. Cas— it wasn't fair. Just saying all of that to me, and leaving me to deal with the fallout by myself. I mean, what the hell was I supposed to do?”
Castiel doesn't have an answer for that. In his mind, the Dean he left behind had been a vignette, rewinding, of those final moments alone. There was no after. Just the dark of a finished tape, and the memory beginning anew.
“I cried for hours,” Dean whispers hoarsely. “Just cried and cried. I couldn't fucking stop. I just stayed there, in that basement, like I was waiting for you to show up again. With a goddamn hole in my chest.”
There was no injury. Castiel is certain of this. He straightens, glances over at Dean to trace his clenched jaw, his furrowed brow, all the pain bared on his face. What Dean speaks of isn't a tangible wound, but an absence.
“I'm sorry for leaving you,” Castiel murmurs, “but I am not sorry for saving you.”
“And what you said? Are you sorry for that too?” Dean asks roughly, like he's throwing stones.
Castiel looks back at the TV. “No, Dean. I'm not sorry for loving you.”
“Wrong answer,” Dean laughs humourlessly, sniffling. “Loving me got you killed. Why the hell would you want that?”
The couple in the sitcom are dancing across their living room, the woman laughing and tossing her hair back with delight. Books and papers go flying as an errant limb knocks them over. Low lamplight glows over their smiling faces. So simple, yet so unattainable.
“You know why,” Castiel finally says. He listens to the rock and swell of faint music coming from the screen. “Do with me what you want, but don't tell me not to love you. That is one thing I… can't do.”
“What am I supposed to do with that?” Dean whispers.
Castiel turns to him. They're sitting close enough that he can see the web of Dean's eyelashes, damp and clinging together. His cheek is creased in a soft pink line from his pillow. It is almost like lying in bed together, restful, intimate, with their bodies sinking into the sofa like this, heads tilted back.
“Whatever you want,” Castiel tells him honestly, staring deep into the pools of his trembling irises.
“Cas,” Dean says, throat working visibly. “I want you to stay. With me.”
“I will. I'm not going anywhere.”
“I want…” Dean's adam's apple bobs as he swallows. “I want you to…”
There, he stops. Castiel waits, but nothing more is forthcoming. He is content to stay exactly where he is, warm and sated, staring into Dean's kind eyes.
He imagines he can almost see the luminary glow of Dean's soul through them, like sunlight pouring through a stained glass window. It is one thing he misses from being an angel. His human eyes cannot comprehend the depths of Dean's inner intricacies.
“Cas,” Dean murmurs, plaintive, pleading.
“I don't know what you want,” Castiel says helplessly.
A steady warmth thrums between them like a livewire. All at once, Dean is leaning closer, closing his eyes. Castiel's flutter shut in kind. Dean presses their foreheads together, so that each breath is trapped between them, blowing hot against Castiel's mouth. He basks in it, breathes it in, blood pulsing in his ears as though he's standing at a great, dizzying height.
“Oh,” Castiel sighs. His lips part, captivated.
“Hell if I do, either,” Dean breathes out, and kisses him.
It is far more than Castiel had dared to want. It consumes him in a heady wildfire. The gentleness of Dean's lips, slotting against his own, breathing him in. Dean presses his fingertips to Castiel's jaw, thumb stroking his cheekbone as lightly as though the skin were bruised.
Dean pulls back so that their noses brush, his tongue darting out to wet his cupid’s bow lips with uncertainty.
“Dean,” Castiel says, voice rough with want, and that's all he gets out before he's pulling Dean close again, sealing their lips.
His enthusiasm seems to erase all of Dean's careful hesitation. Castiel feels the muscles of Dean's arm shift beneath his grip as he raises it, burying a hand in Castiel's hair and sifting through it. They hold tightly to one another, panting breaths exchanged where they part for air, and it tastes like paradise.
“Is this what you want?” Castiel asks, against Dean's lips, just to hear it.
“Yeah,” Dean manages, breathing heavily. “Shit, Cas. Cas. I want you.”
It lights like a flare against Castiel's insides. Happiness, he thinks, is much more than just saying it. There's something to be said about having it, too.
He melts against Dean, holding him in his arms, and breathes against the heat of his neck. It feels like coming home. Slowly, Dean drags his fingers through Castiel's hair, tracing the shell of his ear with such a gentleness it hardly seems possible. They lie together, curled around each other like two crescent moons, and they sleep.