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Lisa always went to bed at the same time every night, it was their routine. Perfected in the months since Dean showed up a mess on her doorstep, distraught over the loss of Sammy, and hurt that Cas just walked away without a second thought. Of course, he didn’t see the Angel watching him almost daily from the corner of his yard while he cleaned, or watching over him while he slept. He never saw the fondness on Cas’ face when he was showing Ben something new under the hood of his truck, all because Cas didn’t want him to see. Dean Winchester was saved for the second time, saved from a life he didn’t want, that was forced onto him, and Cas was damned if he was going to drag Dean back in just because of a war in heaven that the man couldn’t stop but the angel knew that his human would still try if he knew . It’s been hard to watch him this way, watch him live life like Castiel had never been apart of it. But this was his punishment for falling so irretrievably, both from Heaven, and in love with someone who would never love him back. The only other creature that knew Cas watched Dean the way he did was the King of Hell, Crowley, but Cas would smite him on sight if he ever so much as breathed near Dean wrong. The newly aggrandized Seraph was working with the Demon purely out of necessity, and his visits with Dean were a daily-needed reprieve from the innate betrayal he felt working with Crowley.
Tonight, however, was different from his usual silent times with Dean. Lisa had gone to bed, and usually Dean would follow her not twenty minutes later after closing the blinds, checking the locks, the devil's trap under the rug, and looking in on Ben, but not tonight. It has been over an hour since Lisa left and although Cas could sense she was still awake, she stayed in the other room and allowed Dean what he thought was his alone time. Downing the drink in his hand, the oldest Winchester made a move to stand, leaning forward as if he was going to rest his palms on his knees and push himself to a stand, but instead it was his elbows that came to rest on his knees and he bowed his head as if to pray. Why would he be praying? God is gone he knows this. There is no one out there listening save for the angel across the room, and it isn’t like he’s prayed to Cas since Sam sacrificed himself, so why would he start now? But the words that pour from the man’s lips speak to the contrary of his last thought.
"Cas? Hey, man I uh… I hope wherever you are you got your ears on and are listening. " He clears his throat and rubs his face. "Listen, I know it’s late. Well, it is for me who knows if time even exists wherever you’re at, but uh-I just... shit I gotta be quiet Lisa’s just down the hall, and I really don’t know what she’d think of this whole me praying to you thing." Despite the drink he finished, Cas knows Dean isn’t drunk, and he knows Dean is feeling he should drink more before continuing what is most likely going to be full of feelings the man doesn’t know how to express. "Damnit, Castiel, why’d you have to go and fly off the way you did? Leave me here so I go crawling to her to pick up the pieces? It should be you here, man. " His voice, barely above a whisper, shakes with his words and tears that want to fall.
Cas cocks his head in confusion. Why is Dean saying these things? Of course, Cas wants to hear all of these things from his human, and hearing his heavenly name fall from Dean’s lips at this moment sounds sweeter than any other sound his father has or will create. Dean makes him want to give up again, to let Raphael have Heaven so he can stay on earth with Dean, but he can’t because if he does, all Dean has sacrificed will be for nothing and he refuses to do that to him. That doesn’t make it any less hard to be faithful to his cause.
"I don’t know why this is all coming out tonight, I just…I’ve been dreaming, ya know, and not the Hell dreams, or the monsters, or any of that crap, mostly... mostly they’ve been of you, of us and all the good shit I know I can’t have because damnit you’re a friggin’ angel of the lord and I’m just me. And God brought you back for a reason, not just to be whatever we’ve been, because it’s not like the big guy is even okay with this sort of deal. An angel and a human doing what we’ve been doing? That’s gotta break like all of Heaven’s rules for fraternizing or whatever. It’s not like it’s real cool down here either. If Sammy ever..." It’s raw and honest, two things Dean rarely ever is except for in dire circumstances or in moments right after the two of them are intimate, and even those do not last as long as this one has. Dean is pouring his heart out, and if Cas couldn’t already see his soul, that too would be on display in front of him. It makes him weak, with the same feeling as when he fell for Dean in every definition of the word. If he could, he would do anything for the man in front of him.
"Castiel... just come back" There it is again, he’s so used to hearing the shortened version that upon hearing "Shield of God", he shudders.
For a moment, Dean sees something in the corner of his eye. He may be retired, tired, and unguarded, but that does not mean he’s gone soft, but as soon as he looks up it’s only the corner of the room he’s looking at. While the angel standing there is staring into spring green, shimmering with unshed tears, it’s enough to make him give in and relent his transparent facade just to go to him and give him the love, and comfort a vulnerable Dean needs. But if he did that, Cas knows he would not return to his mission, he would never leave Dean’s side again.
There’s nothing there. The hunter-former hunter-knows this, but that doesn’t change the consiousness that he wasn’t alone in his living room, so he stares at the corner as if he concentrates harder he can glance at whatever’s there.
"Cas?" Had he heard? Is he standing there watching? Listening? Dean stands up to move closer when a hand is placed on his arm, breaking him from the emotional trance he’s been lost in.
"Honey, it’s late." She came for him, and when he turns around to face her, all evidence of the tears in his eyes gone and a soft simulated smile on his lips. "Come to bed."
He doesn’t need to guess that it was Cas that was standing there in the corner of his living room. He can hear the small whoosh of his wings as he flys away. Dean nods to Lisa.
As they retreat upstairs to their bedroom Dean prays two final words "Goodnight Castiel." and that’s when Cas decides that out of the two of them Dean is more fit to be the Angel because something can only sound so heavenly if it were coming from the lips of an Angel.