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He had been back for only two days when they came across a new case. Not enough time to really get used to having a room to call his own, or Juliet having waited for him, or the boys treating him, well... nicely.
But a case was a case, and soon Crowley found himself at a table with the others, researching.
He’d always been jealous of the Men of Letter’s library, even if some of their sources were utterly inaccurate.
Couples had been going missing in Pennsylvania every new moon; it didn’t take them long to find old urban legends about a creature stalking lovers.
“Alright, sounds like a case for Team free Will“ Dean decided. “Let’s go”.
And they left him right there in the war room. Crowley tried his best not to feel left out, but it was difficult to deal with being shoved to the side as if he was nothing, especially since he’d been used to constant fighting for almost two years. With a sigh, he began putting back the books they had used for their research.
Maybe he’d take Juliet on a long walk later.
The door opened.
“Crowley, what – “
He turned around to see understanding in Dean’s eyes.
“I get it, man, you properly want everything to be all orderly now to ground yourself, but we can really do this when we get back. Come on.”
Still rather unsure why he should, he followed Dean. In the corridor Juliet joined them.
“Ugh” Dean sighed. “Don’t worry, you slobbering mess, I’ll bring him back, I promise”.
The penny only dropped when they joined Sam and Cas in the garage; next to the former angel lay Crowley’s duffle bag.
Alright then.
“Thanks”.
“You’re welcome”.
And without anyone mentioning it or even making one comment, he found himself in the back of the Impala with the boys.
“We need to stop at a copy shop, Crowley hasn’t got his credentials yet” Dean remarked.
“Split up? Cas and me go looking for a motel, you show him the ropes?”
“Sure”.
“I think I’d be able to fake a FBI badge” he muttered later in the shop.
“Not so loud” Dean mumbled back. “So, what’s your name? I don’t think Jay Z is gonna fly with the officials.”
“John Bonham” he said without thinking. Dean raised an eyebrow.
“Fine by me”.
After another stop, this time for clothes shopping, they were changing in the motel room they’d procured. It wasn’t difficult to guess why Dean had decided to share with him again – both Sam and Cas, while perfectly friendly, were still a bit wary of him.
The more pessimistic part of him didn’t expect that to change in the time to come.
When he stepped out of the bathroom in a suit for the first time in years, Dean chuckled.
“That brings back memories...”
“Maybe for you” he said. “I used to wear much better quality, thank you”.
“Ah yes, we poor modest hunters can’t afford Armani, I’m sorry your Highness”.
“You should be” he muttered but there was no heat behind ut, as he was well aware Dean knew.
The hunter grinned.
“Alright then, let’s talk to the police”.
As always, law enforcement was disgustingly easy to fool.
What was new, however was that certain... friendliness people tended to treat him with.
He’d got used to it in the other world – and had eventually concluded that, whether people had known him to be a demon or not, some sort of instinct had told them to be careful around him – but here is still felt new.
“You been doing this long?” the deputy asked him casually as he handed him a file.
“Not that long. I’m actually the new one in the team”.
He grinned sympathetically.
“Beginnings are always rough”.
But that was the thing.
It wasn’t.
The boys would have had every right to throw him out on the street, but they hadn’t. They had every reason to be suspicious of him, but they weren’t. They had every opportunity to pay him back for the problems he’d caused them, but they weren’t doing that, either.
Add to this a hunt that was actually pretty easy and left them relaxed and laughing on the drive back...
If he hadn’t known that monsters had been eradicated in the Apocalypse, he would have thought a djinn had grabbed him. It was impossible, of course; apart from there not being anyone to grab him, he hadn’t had any weird flashes or seen blue light.
Another possibility would have been that he had died and gone to Heaven, but not only did he sincerely doubt he’d end up there, he would only have been able to view his memories then, and what he was living through certainly weren’t memories.
That night, when the boys were all asleep and he was trying to get some rest himself, he decided to use the patented Dean Winchester method of coping.
To his joy, he could easily get drunk now, especially since he wasn’t used to hard drinks anymore.
He’d only forgotten two things.
First, people tended to make very, very stupid decisions when they were drunk.
Second, he’d either been a mean or a weepy drunk in his previous mortal life, and considering his character now, signs were definitely pointing to weepy.
And because he hadn’t paid attention to these details, he woke up the next morning in his bed after a black out, Juliet a comforting presence at his side.
He was too out of it to register anything but a blinding headache and the aspirin someone had laid out next to him. He swallowed the tablets and gulped down the glass of water next to them before passing out again.
When he woke up again, he felt much better. Juliet still hadn’t moved and he patted her comfortingly as he sat up.
The door opened and Dean looked in. For a second, something like relief crossed his face before he became angry.
He stepped in but, Crowley registered thankfully, he didn’t slam the door behind him.
“Crowley, you goddamn idiot”.
Juliet barked and left the bed, trotting up to Dean.
He sighed as he looked down at nothing.
“Yeah, yeah, you did good, you mutt.”
He reached down and appeared to be scratching her behind the ears. Crowley had been suspecting that he’d spent more time with her in the last six months than he’d let on.
It was only now that he realized his right forearm was bandaged.
“What happened?”
“You can’t remember. No, of course you can’t, because that would actually be practical.”
After a pause, he continued, “Juliet woke me up. Kept scratching at my door. I’m pretty sure it was her who’d already made you put the knife down too, although I don’t know how”.
It was strange to see his usual mixture of anger and concern directed at him instead of Sam or Cas.
“I thought you had – I thought you tried to –“ He made an aborted gesture with his arm. Crowley understood.
“But then you started babbling about how you were just sure this wasn’t a djinn dream or whatever, so I assume it was just one of these awesome drunken decisions?”
“It must have been although I don’t remember it. I assure you I have no intention of killing myself.”
This time, the relief was unmistakeable.
“Good.”
Then his expression turned into one of disbelief.
“Dude, seriously? You thought this was a djinn dream?”
When he didn’t answer, he added, “Barely any Craig, no money for Armani suits, your throne is long gone...”
“I told you I hated being King of Hell.”
“As it was. I thought for sure your djinn dream would have been something like still being King but everybody obeys you and it isn’t such a pain in the ass”.
He’d never even considered that.
“I like being part of your team” he told him the truth. He still couldn’t quite believe that Dean had automatically made him part of their Team Free Will they’d harped on about for years now.
Juliet returned to him and hopped on his bed. Dean grimaced.
“She tried to do that with me a few times too”.
“I’m not so cruel to kick her out, and that’s why we love Papa more than the others, right, sweetheart?”
“Look, Crowley...” Dean hesitated and stepped closer before continuing, “I’m not saying don’t get drunk because frankly I have no right to tell anyone that. I’m just saying... before you make such decisions... Come to me first, right? I don’t care if it’s three am and you have to wake me up. Just come to me first.”
He nodded, speechless.
Dean seemed relieved that he hadn’t answered.
“Alright. Dinner’s gonna be on the table soon, in case you wanna take a shower before or whatever”.
With these words, he left.
Crowley sighed. Whatever he had been doing last night, it definitely didn’t count as looking after the boys, as Mary had told him to do.
Still – he couldn’t deny it felt – good that Dean had looked after him.
And of course Juliet had been there as well.
“Thank you” he told his dog, “Promise I’ll do better”.
When he eventually made it to dinner, no one mentioned his adventure from the night before.
He was not surprised when Castiel approached him in the library later, however.
“You don’t have to, Cassie. I don’t need to get used to being human. I’ve already been one for two years, remember?”
“I think you need to get used to being here” he told him gently.
He shrugged.
“Dean was very worried. We all were”.
He snorted; he couldn’t exactly picture Sam all that concerned for his well being.
“We truly were. You’ve done a lot for us, Crowley”.
“Yeah, well... you kill yourself once for someone and they start calling themselves your friends. Unbelievable”.
Cas gave him a small smile.
“I wouldn’t have expected this to happen either”.
No one would have, he thought, remembering the days they’d conspired to open Purgatory (although not for too long, never for too long, because the memories of torturing monsters were no longer pleasant ones).
“Look at us bunch of dysfunctional hunters”.
“Hardly dysfunctional. You are an excellent fighter”.
“That’s what two years of the Apocalypse do to you. Should have seen me in the beginning. I was almost as helpless as you guys”.
“I’m sure that’s not true. I had to relearn to fight in a completely different way as well. Dean wouldn’t let me out of my room for two weeks in the beginning”.
He smirked.
“Guess dying and coming back human does that to you”.
“I told him repeatedly I was alright, but that didn’t stop him”.
“Our history didn’t stop him from helping me yesterday either”.
“I think Dean prefers the term “blank slate”” Cas said carefully. “He told me after I came back to life that he was “done with the goddamn betrayals””.
He still did the air quotes. Crowley suppressed a chuckle.
“That explains a lot”.
For example, Dean’s insistence that they didn’t think too much about the past but that him reappearing in their lives was “a good thing” and that they should focus on that.
“Crowley”.
Castiel grew serious – well, even more serious. He really should try and lighten feathers up a bit, one of these days.
“I know that... adjusting isn’t easy. But as I have come to know Mary Winchester... usually when she does something, she has reasons for it”.
“Misguided ones, you mean”.
“I wasn’t saying that she was misguided concerning this. She was right”.
He couldn’t help but feel surprised yet again.
The second member of their... family? who’d told him that.
Cas uncharacteristically reached out and squeezed his shoulder.
“Crowley, I do believe we could become good friends.”
“Me too, kitten”.
His eyes narrowed, but he smiled.
A few days later, he had another bad night, as he’d come to call them. He woke up from a nightmare of a particularly vigorous torture session on a hunter and couldn’t go back to sleep.
Crowley could have dealt with it on his own, but on the other hand...
While there was a chance that he and Cas – and perhaps Sam, although he considered it unlikely – could become friends, it felt like he and Dean were already and had been for quite some time.
He knocked on Dean’s door.
The hunter looked tired, but grinned at him nonetheless.
“Time for a nightcap, I’d say”.
And they went to the library, Juliet happily following them.