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It was nearly sunrise, when Dean finally fell asleep in the front seat of the Impala, clothes reeking of woodsmoke and human remains. Castiel hadn’t intended to stay this long.
Dean and Sam had needed to clear out their motel room as soon as the case was complete. Dean had sent Sam to stand watch while he wrapped Pamela’s lifeless body in one of the motel sheets. Castiel, invisible and reluctant to leave Dean’s immediate vicinity, watched as he went through the arduous task of cleaning the room, erasing any trace of blood, wiping their fingerprints off of the surfaces they’d touched.
Dean had asked why Castiel couldn’t spare the lives of those innocents who’d been killed in this town, why he could not spare Pamela Barnes. It was true, what he’d told him – that there is a season to all things. But even Castiel was not satisfied with his response to Dean’s other assertion, that Castiel ‘made an exception’ for Dean. All he’d been able to say in reply – ‘you’re different’ – could not hope to encapsulate why it was he stood to shield Dean from harm, even now, even when his mission was as good as finished.
They’d burned the body, had collected the dry fallen limbs of trees for over an hour beforehand, secreted away in a high clearing, the land curving down in all directions, naked winter trees prickling the landscape like a thousand twisted fenceposts. Carrying her body up to the clearing from where they’d parked the car took over half an hour. Castiel couldn’t stop staring at the sweat blooming on Dean’s brow as he labored, at the steam rising from his heated flesh where it chafed against the cold March air.
He’d sent Sam back to the car to sleep long before the work was done. It took him nearly an hour to dismantle the remains of the pyre to his satisfaction, leaving no trace of what they’d done there besides the scorched earth where the flames had licked the grass.
Of course, some of that time was spent resting, leaning hard against a nearby cottonwood. He hadn’t rested when Sam was here helping him, and Castiel wonders if he hadn’t needed to, or just didn’t want his younger brother to see him breathe like this. To see him draw sharp inhales and press the used air out in pained groans, to see him hold the heels of his dirty hands against his lidded eyes, lower lip shuddering.
Castiel hadn’t intended to reveal himself at all this evening. He only meant to supervise their work. To be at hand, should Dean need him. It struck him only later, only when he was watching Dean struggle with the weight of Pamela’s body as he crested the hill upon which he’d built her funeral pyre, that perhaps Dean would have considered his protection of Pamela more important. That Castiel’s failure to save this woman’s life was, by extension, a failure to protect Dean.
No, Castiel hadn’t intended to reveal himself to Dean, but he also hadn’t anticipated Alastair’s involvement. The sudden icy froth of Dean’s fear spun Castiel out of the cautious flow of observation, launched him into the rock-studded rapids of that panic, so much like the stinging horror of Dean’s nightmares. The reflex was so ingrained in him, to reach out as soon as he tasted the first delicate waft of Dean’s distress, to steady him with his grace, that when he sensed the full extent of Dean’s waking terror, he lost all control. His grace rose inside him, overflowed, a flash-flood of power surging over the banks of his body and gushing out in Alastair’s unholy direction.
This burst of grace manifested as a tremendous bolt of lightning, Heavenly light scalding Alastair down to his gangrenous core. It wasn’t enough to kill the demon, but it was at least sufficient to send him into instantaneous retreat. And when Dean’s fear did not dissipate along with Alastair? When he trembled as he tried to imagine what awful thing would find him next, what monstrous power capable of striking such a demon would reveal itself in that alley next? Castiel could not resist assuaging that fear, making himself visible behind him, announcing his benevolent presence.
It may have been worth it, just for the wash of relief that cascaded down his radiant features, when first he beheld Castiel’s vessel at his side. How he longed to be looked at with such gratitude, forbidden though such longing may be. How he longed to be looked at by Dean, caressed by the tender green of his gaze.
That same look, the bewildered succor of relief, swept over Dean’s face when he told him he was an exception, that he was different. In the eyes of Heaven, perhaps. But what he’d meant – and what Dean no doubt heard in the steady wonder of his tone – was that Dean was different in Castiel’s eyes. That the standards that had bound his course all his life had ceased to guide him, in the wake of Dean’s influence upon him.
Castiel hadn’t intended to linger so long, hadn’t intended to follow Dean on his lonesome trek back down to his vehicle, wherein Sam was already fast asleep, limbs folded inelegantly to fit himself across the span of the backseat. He hadn’t intended to stand at the edge of the wood, watching Dean scrub the ash and dirt from his hands and face with the dregs of a gas station water bottle. He hadn’t intended to walk towards him where he leaned on the trunk of the car, ruddy face tipped up to behold the stars where they clustered thick overhead, no light pollution here to conceal their multitudes. He hadn’t intended to climb into the car beside him, unseen and unsensed, nestled between dimensions so they’d both fit in the front seat.
It doesn’t matter, what Castiel does or does not intend. He’s a river coursing down the side of a mountain, and whatever he may intend, he will always end up here. The thought is as hopeless as it is comforting.
He’d watched Dean sleep in his car before. It wasn’t uncommon, that he and his brother could not afford to lodge in a motel for the night, and as the weather warmed, they chose to sleep in their vehicle more and more. It was not warm, this night, but the circumstances that caused them to abandon their motel room were a significantly extenuating factor, Castiel reasoned.
Beside him, Dean whimpered in his slumber, brow pinching. Castiel laid an invisible hand across his forehead, letting his grace flow where it wishes, letting his mercy sweep through Dean’s mind, a sacred flood, freshwater tendrils of the Nile seeping into hungry soil.
In his dream, Dean had been pursued afresh by Alastair in the alleyway, and Castiel had not come to his aid. His tormentor was inches from capturing him, with promises to return to Hell, where Alastair alleged that Dean belonged.
When his grace altered the dream, it ended instead as it had in real life, with a stroke of divinity that spelled Dean’s salvation. With that look, the revelation that it was Castiel who’d saved him from Alastair. In his sleep, Dean sighed his name, reverent like the opening of a prayer, Castiel, beatific smile warming his face, Castiel froze, hand still resting on Dean’s forehead, weathering the rush of sun-bright heat that overtook him at the sweet sound of his name between Dean’s holy lips.
A human person may have recognized that feeling as joy. Castiel recognized it only as forbidden.
In an instant, he fled.
From afar, he resolved to be more diligent. To be more discerning. To cultivate distance, between himself and his charge.
It doesn’t matter, what Castiel does or does not intend. He will always end up here.