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A ringing phone.
Dean is alone in the Bunker; Sam left for a hunt yesterday, a skinwalker in Nebraska. He decided – or maybe he and Cas decided, Dean doesn’t know – that Dean isn’t up to it, not yet. That Dean still needs to recover from the fight with Cain.
It’s been a week. The Mark still hums with energy, a hunger for the Blade. It pulses in Dean’s veins, at the base of his skull, behind his eyes. So maybe they’re right, maybe he needs to back down, until he can get himself under control again. Dean’s not sure. He’s not sure of much right now.
He finds the ringing phone. It’s Sam’s, left behind accidentally. They keep their contacts unlabeled in case the phones fall into the wrong hands, but Dean recognizes the number. He swallows, thumb hovering over the green accept button. He makes himself take the call and hold the phone to his ear.
“Sam? How is he?” Cas says, quickly, words tumbling out.
“Uh,” Dean says, “Sam isn’t– he forgot his phone.”
Cas pauses. “Dean?”
“Yeah, hey Cas. If you really need that update on my condition, you could call back in a few days. Or you could, you know, call me.”
He’s not sure where the bitterness comes from. Maybe it’s that Cas and Sam have been exchanging calls for weeks behind Dean’s back. Like Cas doesn’t want to deal with Dean anymore. Even when he’s here, when he’s taking the Blade from Dean’s trembling hands, he’s not– not really here. Not with Dean.
“Dean,” Cas says. “I would, but you haven’t been picking up your phone.”
Dean scoffs, because he has. Hasn’t he? “Whatever, man. What do you need?”
“I,” says Cas, “I wanted to check in.”
“On me? Make sure I haven’t gone full-on Jack Torrance again?”
“Dean,” Cas sighs. There’s a tension in his voice, a simmering frustration, and Dean feels a small measure of satisfaction.
“I don’t need a babysitter, dude.”
“I’m not your–” Cas stops. The line crackles. “I’m on my way to you.”
“Oh, great. Sam asked you to? You guys taking shifts now?”
“No,” Cas says. “Sam didn’t ask me to do anything. I want to be with you.”
Dean’s retort gets stuck in his throat. He coughs. He tries to find something to say and finds only empty air.
“I’ll be there in a few hours,” Cas says, and it sounds like he’s going to hang up. Dean’s shoulders tense.
“Cas,” he blurts, and his voice cracks. God, it’s embarrassing, but the line stays open and quiet. He grasps for words, anything to keep Cas on the line. He didn’t have anything else to say, but this is Cas, talking directly to him, and he’s not gonna– “Talk to me. Tell me what you’re up to.”
The silence is a little too long, and Dean’s breathing is erratic. He sits down. He puts his hands on the desk and his head on his hands.
Cas says, “I’m driving, currently. Before that, I was staying in a motel in Milwaukee. I thought I had a lead there.”
“A lead? On what, an angel thing?”
“On the Mark.”
“Cas.”
“I know you think this is over, Dean–”
“It is over.”
“–but I will not give up. On this, on you.”
Dean rubs a hand over his face. “You’re fighting a lost cause, man.”
“No,” Cas says, and that’s all he says.
“You have bigger problems right now.”
“Yes,” Cas says, “but I don’t care. There are more important things.”
Like me? Dean almost asks. He wants to ask. He thinks that’s what Cas is saying. He hopes. The ambiguity of Cas’s words hangs in the air, right in front of Dean’s face.
But he doesn’t say anything. The silence widens, stretching out between them. Dean doesn’t want to be the first to hang up.
“What if it doesn’t go away?” he mumbles.
There’s a beat. “You mean–”
“This feeling. This, this burning. Like–” He takes a deep breath. Closes his eyes. “Never mind.”
“Dean.”
“It’s bad, Cas. It’s getting bad.”
“Tell me.”
Dean sets down the phone, carefully, on the table. He picks at the cuff of his shirt and pretends he’s not digging his fingers into the Mark.
“Dean? Are you still there?”
“Yeah,” he says. “I’m just. Thinking. Um. I don’t feel like myself, sometimes. I feel like I’m back to what I was in– in Hell, near the end.”
“No, you’re not.”
“How do you know?” Dean says, too quickly. He bites his cheek until he tastes blood.
“Because I was there,” Cas says simply. “You are trying, Dean. You are fighting it.”
“I’m losing.”
“Maybe,” Cas says. “But if nothing we do matters, then all that matters is what we do.”
“Yeah, but–” Wait. Dean stops, wrinkles his nose. “Did you just quote Buffy?”
Cas sighs. “You’re missing the point.”
“No, it’s just– okay. Fine. I know what you’re saying, but–”
“But what?”
“What if it isn’t the Mark? What if it’s just– me?”
“Dean.”
Dean stops. He pinches the bridge of his nose. Closes his eyes.
“Sometimes,” he says, “sometimes I feel like when I die, I’ll go to Purgatory.”
Cas lets out this soft, “Oh,” and then, “That’s not true.”
“But what if–”
“It’s not true.”
“Cas, dammit–”
“Listen, I need to focus on driving. We can continue this conversation when I’m there.”
Dean falters. He forces himself to take a deep breath. “Yeah,” he says. He waits for Cas to hang up.
Cas is on his doorstep two hours later. Dean lets him in. Neither of them says much. Cas follows Dean down to the library, the silence between them louder than their boots on the stairs.
“Uh,” Dean says. Cas sits down. Dean thinks about sitting across from him, except then they’d just be sitting there staring at each other and, no. He wanders around instead, pretends to look at books on the shelves. He doesn’t know what to do with his hands.
(His hands need a weapon. A blade. Cas may be an angel but there is blood thrumming in his veins and Dean could cut, and cut, until his hands drip scarlet and Cas’s blue eyes dim and oh, how nice it would feel. The rush of adrenaline, the metallic smell of iron, the slick, warm blood.)
No. Dean pinches his eyes shut until he sees spots. Digs his fingernails into his palms. This is not him, this is the Mark. This is not him, this is the Mark.
“Dean?” Cas asks. “Are you all right?” He sounds so goddamn well-intentioned.
“You need to leave,” Dean says. “Now.”
“But I just got here.”
“Now,” Dean says, lower, harsher. “Get the fuck out of here.”
“No,” Cas says, and Dean hears him getting up from the table.
“Cas.” Dean puts his hand on the frame of a bookshelf and leans into it, ducks his head away from Cas’s gaze. The Mark is burning hot on the inside of his arm, angry and fiery and screaming for action. “Don’t you dare come any closer,” he says.
Except Cas has never been one to listen to commands. He puts his hand on Dean’s shoulder.
The reaction is visceral, involuntary. Dean spins, slamming Cas’s hand away with a forearm. His hands claw at Cas’s shirt, curl into the collar. He shoves Cas up against the bookshelf and actually snarls. Every muscle in his body is wired, ready to snap.
But Cas doesn’t do a thing to defend himself. He lets Dean pin him there, hands hanging at his sides. He doesn’t flinch when Dean’s nails scrape along his throat. His eyes are blue and steady and calm.
Dean’s hand presses over Cas’s heart, and his heartbeat is flying fast, too fast.
Oh, God. He’s scared out of his mind. He’s fucking terrified of Dean.
Dean’s hands fall away. His chest feels suddenly empty, scraped raw. He staggers away, tripping over a chair. “Shit. Shit, Cas, I didn’t mean to–”
“I know,” Cas says, but he’s looking at Dean with guarded eyes.
“I,” Dean says, and suddenly his lungs are gasping for air and he can’t breathe, he can’t breathe, he– oh, God. His skin feels too hot and his throat is closing up and Cas is just standing there, staring at him.
“Dean–”
“I could have hurt you,” Dean says, and his lungs are still burning and empty but he can manage that. “I told you to leave, I was gonna– the Mark, I can’t–”
“You can,” Cas says. “You did. I’m fine.”
“This is like,” Dean says, and he wheezes a laugh, “this is like the crypt. With you and the mind control and the angel tablet.”
Cas doesn’t laugh. He takes a step towards Dean, and Dean backs away.
“No. Don’t come near me.”
Cas puts his hands in his pockets. Dean doesn’t think he’s ever seen Cas do that. It’s a very human gesture. “Okay,” Cas says. “Then I’m going to get you a glass of water.”
“Whiskey,” Dean corrects.
“Water,” Cas says, firmly. “Can you sit down and wait until I get back?”
“Yeah,” he says. Cas leaves, and Dean falls into a chair. He presses his forehead against the cool wood of the table and focuses on breathing.
Footsteps. Cas sets down a glass of clear water. The red behind Dean’s eyes begins to fade. Cas sits down beside him and watches until he drinks.
“Cain said–” Dean starts, when he’s finished the water.
“I don’t care what Cain said,” Cas says.
“But–”
“It doesn’t matter. He’s dead now.”
“Yeah, I know, that’s why we’re in this fucking mess.”
“Dean,” Cas sighs, soft and– tender. Or something. Something in his voice sounds so forgiving.
Dean slumps forward until his face presses into Cas’s shoulder. It’s not exactly comfortable, but it is comforting. Cas is warm and still.
“Hey,” Dean says. “I’m sorry.”
“Me too,” Cas says. He doesn’t know what Cas is sorry for, but somehow that makes it even sadder.
“I don’t want you to leave,” he says. “Not really.” He turns his head, just a little, so his cheek is against Cas’s collar. He noses at Cas’s jaw, and the stubble there. He brushes his lips over Cas’s pulse.
“Dean,” Cas says. “What are you doing?”
“Mmm,” Dean mumbles. He kisses the corner of Cas’s mouth.
Cas sighs, and then he brings his hands to either side of Dean’s face and kisses him. Carefully, slowly. His lips taste like sea salt.
“Hey,” Dean says, when the kiss ends.
Cas’s hand shifts, and he presses his thumb to Dean’s bottom lip. “Hey.”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
Cas kisses Dean’s forehead, and then his lips. “You won’t.”
“I might.”
“You won’t.”
Dean curls his hands into Cas’s coat. He kisses the spot under Cas’s ear that he’s always wanted to kiss. “You really believe that?”
Cas laughs, gently. “I have a great deal of faith in you, Dean.”
“Yeah,” Dean says, “I guess so.” He thinks about that for a bit.
Cas clears his throat. “About what you said earlier. About Purgatory.”
Dean shakes his head. “I was just saying things, I didn’t–”
“You meant it,” Cas says. “And I don’t like that.”
Dean leans back in his chair. He looks at his hands, at the scars on his knuckles.
“You are brave, and you are good. You are not the Mark of Cain, though you carry it. Do you understand?”
“Yeah,” Dean says. Maybe he’s really beginning to.
“Good.” Cas puts his hand over Dean’s, on the table. He has scars on his knuckles too.
Dean thinks about saying it. Here, now. He doesn’t know what Cas will do, if Cas will– feel the same way. Maybe he’s misjudged this. Misjudged them.
Or maybe not.
“I love you,” Dean says. He stares at the grain of the table. Cas lets go of his hand. He closes his eyes.
“Oh, Dean,” Cas says.
“I–” Dean bites his lip, hard. “I really love you. A lot. I’ve known for a long time.”
“Dean. Look at me.”
So he does, and Cas’s eyes are blue like the open sky, and just as bright. “I love you too,” Cas says, and it sounds like a promise of things to come.