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It's like the world, Heaven and Hell and everything in between, wants to keep them apart.
Sam never thought there'd be an after. After the Cage. After being soulless. After Cas broke open Purgatory. After Cas broke the wall in his mind. He didn't think he would survive to deal with the after. He didn't think Cas would either. And for a while, he didn’t. But then Cas came back, and took on Sam's pain from the Cage. Not fully, but the rawest parts. The hallucinations. The ghost of Lucifer's touch on his body. Cas saved him. And now he's here. Not fully himself, but still here.
“Sam?”
Cas enters Rufus’s cabin. It's just the two of them. Sam tries not to flinch at the door slamming shut. There's still those little things that have lingered. Like loud sudden noises, and unwanted touch, and the nightmares. God, the nightmares.
“Hey, Cas,” he says softly.
“You look tired. More so than usual.”
Cas is more blunt now than ever before. Sam chuckles a bit, though without humor.
“Yeah, just… can I be honest with you, Cas?”
“Of course, Sam.”
“Being alive… it's so exhausting.”
“What do you mean?”
“Like… I'm always waiting for the other shoe to drop. I'm just waiting for it, frozen. And around every corner I expect someone to… to hurt me. And it's exhausting.”
“...Did me taking your Hell trauma not help?”
“It did, in a sense that I'm not dying anymore. But it's still there. And it's never going to fully go away,” Sam pauses for a moment, trying to hold himself together. “I'm not sure who I am without it, if that makes sense? Like I spent so long in the Cage, with him, that it's hard to remember anything else.”
Cas thinks for a moment. Sam wrings his hands together anxiously.
“I think that makes sense,” Cas says slowly. “You have had so much trauma in your life, Sam. Even before the Cage. And I wish I could help more than I have hurt.”
“You've done plenty, Cas,” Sam reassures him.
“...You didn't deserve that, Sam. Any of it.”
Sam blinks away tears. Clears his throat. “I don't know about deserve. All I know is that it happened.”
Cas lets silence fall between them for a few moments.
“I'm just… so tired, Cas. So fucking tired.”
Cas frowns. He looks a bit lost on what to say, but his eyes hold concern and worry. “Would you like a hug, Sam?”
Instinctively he stiffens. With his life, the Cage, he's grown to avoid touch. But with Cas… with Cas he does tend to feel safe. He feels cared for. So he nods, albeit slowly, and he freezes when Cas comes close. Cas takes it slow but eventually… holds him. Cas reaches around and holds Sam's shoulders, and Sam rests his head on Cas's chest. It's not just a hug, it's an embrace. It feels… intimate. And instead of shying away from it like he expected, Sam almost loses it and tries to get closer.
He wants to enter through Cas's ribcage and nestle there against his heart. He wants this angel to take care of him and look out for him. He wants him to never let him go again.
Sam chokes back a sob. He feels his insides unraveling, the usually barely-closed door on his emotions starting to burst.
“You're so brave and strong, Sam…”
Sam nuzzles further into Cas's chest, eyes squeezing shut. He doesn't feel strong or brave. He feels lucky, at most. He feels like he survives because he must. Because the other option is giving up and he just hasn't gotten there yet.
Cas kisses the top of Sam's head, and oh, if he was feeling fragile before…
“Promise you won't leave again, Cas,” Sam sobs.
Cas tightens his hold on Sam.
“I promise you for all eternity, Sam.”
And like cutting a balloon, Sam's lets out a breath and feels, finally, at ease.