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Dean knocked on Sam’s door, and Sam groaned. Dean had promised he could handle the interview process without him, and that Sam was free to spend the time with his manuscripts, copying as much as he could before having to set sail for the spring. Every interruption might mean leaving some priceless information behind. No one else on the ship could read, so it was up to Sam to do the scribework, and he was tired, cranky, his hand hurt, his eyes hurt, his head hurt, and now he was getting interrupted on top of everything. “WHAT.”
Dean came in, closing the door behind him. So it was going to be one of those Serious Talks. Just what Sam needed. “So. The interviews for the new weather manipulator, since the old guy got killed on that raid. I’ve got it down to two candidates…”
“And you can choose based on whatever criteria you want, as long as they can get the job done I have no fucks to give,” Sam interrupted. He smirked as something occurred to him. “Even if you’re choosing on the basis of you think you might get to fuck one of them and not the other. Can I get back to work now?”
“Dude, I can get laid whenever I want, so no. It’s not about that. Honestly, I wouldn’t mind bringing them both on board, so that we don’t have to fight our way back to land without any weather control at all if one goes down like we did last fall. The thing is, one of them is someone specific, and I want your opinion on bringing him on your ship before you manage to get even more reclusive and awkward than you already are.” Dean stuck out his tongue at Sam. “C’mon, dude, you know I wouldn’t interrupt you at your studies when you’re this deep in the zone that you’re exhausted and grumpy unless I had a really good reason to. I know you trust me to handle the people while you manage the navigation and knowing where targets will be and who we need to pay off to look the other way when we show up in port and all that stuff. Show me the same trust that I know when you need to be involved, huh?”
“Fine.” Sam carefully blew out the lamp – unattended flame in a room full of parchment was not a good idea – and followed Dean to the unusual captain’s quarters they had set up. Most nights, Sam had it to himself, while Dean slept off his late-night carousing in the early morning while Sam was awake and could manage the ship while his brother got his four hours. There were still two beds, each with privacy curtains, for when one or both had someone they wanted to impress. That didn’t stop the rumors going around the seas, of course, but no one was brave enough to ask Dean or Sam directly.
As soon as Sam got in the room, he realized what Dean meant, and his mouth went dry. He didn’t recognize the red-haired woman, but he did recognize the man in the long tan coat whose blue eyes were staring back in shock.
The memories came in flashes. Watching the stars. Frolicking in the waves. Kissing in the rain. Spending nights together while Dean was at sea.
Dean throwing punches because he thought Sam got taken advantage of. His lover leaving for school, and spending days crying because he couldn’t go too. The news that his lover had been killed at the school.
A hand on his shoulder brought Sam back to the present, and he looked up into Castiel’s face. “They told me you were dead,” he whispered. “For the past twenty years… I thought you were dead.”
“I came home for the summer after that first year, and you were gone,” Castiel whispered in response. “Father and Uriel told me what they’d done to you, making up a story of how I’d been killed at school in the hopes of you doing exactly what you did and leaving town with your brother next time he came back. I don’t blame you one bit. You had no reason not to believe them. I told my family to go to Hell and went right back to school, and I haven’t been home since, either.”
“I never wanted… Castiel, I…” Sam closed his eyes, pressing an old scar on his left hand with his right thumb to ground himself. “I’ve missed you for so long, I can’t believe you’re here. Did you know I was on this ship when you came looking for the job?”
Castiel shook his head. “Not exactly. I saw that Dean was looking for a weather manipulator for his crew, and I figured if anyone would know what became of you after you left home it would be Dean. Even if he wasn’t willing to take me on because he blamed me for your pain, I hoped he would at least tell me if you were well, if you’d managed to build yourself a good life in the years since. Did you? I remember you telling me that you never wanted to go into the family business, that you wanted to go to school like I was and do something respectable and safe instead of becoming a pirate, but you’re here with your brother.”
“I hated it, but with you gone… Dean was literally the only thing I had in the world,” Sam said. “The more I got into the crew, into the job, the more I realized that I’m good at it and this is where I’m meant to be, and I am happy with it, now. I sometimes think about the life we had planned, but you know me. I was never the guy who got so focused on what I wanted but couldn’t have that I couldn’t appreciate what I did end up having.”
“That’s true.” Castiel reached out and gently pushed a strand of hair out of Sam’s face, tucking it behind his ear. “If I come on board, if I join the crew, would you be all right with that?”
Sam fought down the wave of panic. If? Castiel might leave again? He pressed harder on his hand. “Dean came and got me to give my approval, which means that the only if about that statement is me. Castiel, if you leave again… I’m going to think this was some cruel dream. I made myself a good life in a lot of ways, but the one thing I was never able to do. I couldn’t. I couldn’t move on from you. You can’t come back to life and be right there in front of me and disappear again. Please don’t do that to me.”
Castiel reached out, pulling Sam into his arms, and Sam squeezed his eyes closed and breathed in the scent that had haunted his dreams. It was different in some ways, but the core of it, it was there. This was Castiel. That was Castiel’s voice, rougher after twenty years but no less recognizable for it, promising, “I never got over you, either. I’m here. I have no intention of ever leaving you again. I don’t know what gods guided you to this port for the winter, but I will never stop thanking them that we have a second chance.”