Chapter Text
And what once was ours is no one's now
I see you everywhere, the only thing we share
Is this small townTaylor Swift -- "Death by a thousand cuts"
Cas is gone.
Cas is dead.
Cas is dead, dead, dead, dead dead dead dead dead Cas is dead
That’s all Dean can think of.
His phone is buzzing. The ground is stone cold. His heart is beating like mad. Tears run down his face, warm, salty. It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters; everything’s a dream. Nothing is real except that Cas is dead. Dead, gone, dead again, dead forever.
Lost to Dean.
Again.
He promised himself the last time – that it’d be the last time indeed. Cas wouldn’t die on him again. Dean would be better.
But he hasn’t been better, he’s been worse than ever, and now Cas is dead again, dead to save him, taken by evil black goo like the one that coils in Dean’s stomach. It makes him want to throw up, or perhaps to throw things, or maybe to just lay there and wait for the end.
Maybe Chuck has won after all.
Cas’s face – Cas’s happy smile. He’s never seen Cas smile like that. Cas doesn’t smile often, in fact.
And whose fault is that, Dean?
Cas’s eyes, brimming with tears. So blue, so beautiful, gone and closed and cold.
Goodbye, Dean.
Cas’s words just can’t stop echoing in his head.
I made a deal.
I always wondered... what my true happiness could even look like –
For love, for love, for love
You changed me, Dean
I love you
Goodbye.
What even happened? One minute Death was banging at the door and Dean was going to die, and then Cas was telling him about a deal, and sprouting praise at Dean as if Dean were the best thing on Earth, and then – and after that Cas was gone, and Dean was alone.
Cas in the Empty, Dean in an empty world.
Cas was gone, and Dean was frozen on the spot, and he couldn’t understand, and he couldn’t talk – what could he say, what was happening – and Cas was dead now, once again, and Dean didn’t even tell him goodbye, didn’t even –
He told me I love you.
It hits Dean, suddenly.
Cas told him he loved him.
He loves me.
For one moment, Dean can’t even breathe. It takes its time to sink in, as he replays Cas’s words over and over and over. I love you, I love you, I love you.
Cas loves him.
Cas loved him.
The only thing I want, it’s something I know I can’t have.
Is it Cas who said that?
Cas died because he loved him. Fitting. Dean would laugh if he could. The very touch of you corrupts. Everything that touches Dean rots and dies. Everything beautiful that touches him withers and dies away. So Cas, the one who touched him deeper than anyone else – the one who gripped him tight and never let him go – of course Cas would die. As he always does. Cas was doomed ever since he fell in –
He loves me.
And Dean said nothing.
Cas died without knowing that... without hearing that...
Dean gulps. Clenches his jaw. Balls his hands into fists. His nails hurt the flesh here. He has to do it. To admit it to himself. If Cas was brave enough to face the truth, and accept it, and say it out loud, and die for it, then – then Dean can, to.
Cas died, and Dean didn’t say “I love you” back.
New tears run down his cheeks, and he can’t breathe.
Here. It wasn’t that difficult, finally. It just sounds true. It just is true. And Cas is right, after all. It’s a bit of a relief to finally admit it. To let go of it.
It doesn’t hurt less, though. It hurts more, because Cas is dead, and Dean can’t tell him, and they can have nothing, and Cas died not knowing.
He died thinking he wasn’t loved back, Dean realises, and it’s as if someone punched him in the stomach.
Cas thought it was so impossible that Dean may love him too, that he was happy just saying it, happy dying saving Dean, as if that was the best he could ever hope for.
When they could have had so much more.
They could have been so much more, if only Dean had been true to all the promises he made every time Cas died. That he would stop lashing out and pushing him away, that he would tell him, that he’d been honest with himself. He swore to himself the last time that if one day, by a miracle... but a miracle happened and Dean... remained himself.
I’ve run out of second chances, is all.
Sam has lost Eileen, too, and Charlie has lost Stevie. They’ve given love a second chance, and it came to bite them in the ass – because Death, because Chuck. But Dean is the biggest fool of all, because he’s had second chance after second chance, more than he deserves, and he’s never used them, has never tried, and just because of him Cas and he never had a chance to – never even tried...
The only thing I want, it’s something I know I can’t have.
Dean knew he couldn’t have what he wanted, either – except that he could, and he was too stupid to realise it. It’s so blaringly obvious now, in everything Cas has ever said and done. Every touch of his fingers on Dean’s skin – if Dean hadn’t been so busy wishing the butterflies away he would have known. Every time Cas adverted his eyes, kept himself from looking – Dean should have seen it, because he always did the same thing, but hey, he was probably too busy looking away too.
All this time wasted thinking Cas couldn’t possibly love him back – that he was so out of Dean’s league that it wasn’t even an option – that Dean didn’t deserve it anyway – that it would only end in tragedy – that it wasn’t normal and good to feel that way for his best friend, his angel – that Cas surely didn’t have feelings like that – and Cas had liked April and Meg anyways – and there was nothing Dean could offer...
And all this time Cas loved him; all the while Cas thought there was no way Dean could feel the same way...
All this time wasted, and here Cas is, making it beautiful, and real, and true, and the best thing ever to happen to Dean, making it everything Dean ever wanted, only to be taken from him.
If it was all meant to end in tragedy anyway, then why hasn’t Dean tried? A few moments of happiness before the big end – but happiness, for Cas, was dying unloved, dying for Dean, and Dean never hated himself more.
It was all for Dean to take, and – oh – he took – but never the right thing. He’s kept Cas at arm’s length, pushed him away, he’s hidden away the one thing that could have make them both happy, he treated Cas like pure shit...
No, happiness for Cas was fucking dying.
Is it me? Is it me that led him to so much despair that letting go of his love for me is the happiest he can be? That he can leave Earth, and Jack, and Sam, without a regret?
Does he really think there was nothing left for him on Earth?
Nothing more?
If only – he could have – he should have told Cas there was more – they should have...
No, Dean, it’s all on you, it’s not on Cas.
The only real thing in his life – the only thing that was just his and Cas’ – and it never became real.
It’s when he hears a loud crack that Dean realises he’s been punching the wall.
His hand bleeds, red and shiny, just like Cas’s blood – shed for him, shed for love, the last proof that Cas was alive a few moments ago.
But now Cas is dead. He is trapped in a fucking Empty, where there’s only regret and misery.
Well. Maybe Cas and Dean aren’t in such different places after all.
Regret. Will Cas regret not telling Dean before? Will that be what haunts his angel – never trying with Dean? No, probably not.
Because Cas fucking died thinking Dean doesn’t love him, will never love him –
Fuck it.
Dean is up and walking before he even realises he’s made his decision.
He just can’t let that one go. He can’t let Cas die without telling him “I love you too.” He can’t let Cas think for all eternity that his feelings were unrequited. He can’t. He can’t do that to Cas. Cas deserves so much fucking better.
He deserves better than Dean, too, but maybe that shouldn’t matter. Maybe they should just take what they want and be happy, and fuck all the rest.
Fuck fate, fuck curses, fuck God and the Empty and Death. He’s never let any of that stop him. He won’t begin now. Not when Cas needs him.
“The self-hating angel of Thursday,” that’s what Chuck said, right? (Because that’s such a thing to say to your son who’s looked for you and believed in you and loved you all his life, and suddenly, Dean wants Chuck dead more than ever.) Well, no. Dean won’t let that happen. He won’t let Cas die alone and thinking he was unloved and unworthy.
Your problem, Dean, is that you have no faith.
Well, you’re wrong, Cas. I believe in you.