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“Dean - why isn’t Sam praying to me?”
There’s another question there, and Dean hears it, okay? He does. But he’s been driving for seven hours straight and his mom’s asleep in the back seat and this is really not the time to do any of this.
“You know Sam,” he says, a bit too easily. “Overconfident. Badass. He’s probably ganked them all by now, and sleeping it off with some waitress.”
There is a pause, and then -
“You don’t think that.” It’s not even a question.
Dean sighs.
“No, Cas, I don’t,” he says, with a quick glance in the mirror to check that Mary’s still asleep. “You want the truth? I think that bitch still has him, and I think she’s doing some very bad things to him, and not the fun kind. And I think he’s not calling you because he doesn’t want you to fall into a trap.”
There is a slight movement, and then a sound that could almost be a huff.
“I can take care of myself.”
Dean clenches his jaw, says nothing.
“I can take care of myself, Dean.”
Dean shifts a bit, feels the edge of his shirt catch a cut he wouldn’t let Cas heal. Because, yeah, so that bitch is dead, but those things she was using - Dean doesn’t want to think about the last time he saw Cas actually bleed.
“I never said you couldn’t, Cas,” he says, and then he turns the radio on, keeping the volume low.
And if Cas was human, okay, that would be a very clear signal. An I don’t want to do this right now, maybe; or even an I don’t want to do this at all.
But Cas is not human, and some things he just doesn’t get.
“It was my responsibility to watch over Sam,” he says after a while, in a cold, clipped voice, and this is not right - this is not what Dean needs, because Sam is a grown man and he can take care of his damn self and Dean asking Cas to do this - that was - fuck.
And Dad’s been on his mind for two days now, because the woman in the back seat - Mary - his mom, and Jesus Christ - she’s clearly grieving for him, and Dean -
“And you did, okay? And we’re getting him back. Hey,” he adds, reaching a hand out, but stopping a good few inches short of touching Cas, “this was not your fault.”
Cas says nothing.
They drive on for another ten miles or so, and the songs on the radio get steadily worse, but Dean can’t bear the silence and he doesn’t want to reach for the tapes - all he wants to do is sit there and drive and focus on the dull pain of his bruised jaw and not think about Sammy and not think about Cas and not think about Mary and -
“You didn’t pray to me either.”
- goddammit.
Dean’s hands clench on the wheel.
“I - there was no time, Cas. Amara and Chuck, they just,” he makes a vague gesture, because there’s no way he can describe that - the awe and fear that he’d been choking on, “and next thing I knew, I’d basically landed on top of my dead mother. It was -”
He doesn’t know how to finish that sentence.
Cas shakes his head.
“You could have prayed to me,” he says, stubbornly, “later. When you were driving back.”
“Cas, I -”
“I thought you were dead,” Cas snaps. “I thought you were gone.”
Something burns, deep inside Dean’s heart; just catches fire and curls up and blackens at the corners, and whatever it was, it tastes like ashes in his mouth.
“Cas - I - I’m sorry, okay? I just - I didn’t want to broadcast the fucking information, okay? That my mother - that Mary’s back.”
Dean keeps his eyes on the road, but the temperature in the car drops another twenty degrees, and he can feel that just fine.
“You didn’t want to broadcast the information?” Cas repeats, slowly. “How is telling me broadcasting the information?”
“Cas -”
“You think I would tell Heaven? You think I would tell anyone?”
“No, that’s not -”
“After -” Cas starts, and then he stops, his hands clenching into fists, and switches the thing around. “You think I’d betray -”
“Cas, I just meant -”
Cas remains silent, waiting for the end of the sentence, but Dean can’t get it out.
“You don’t trust me,” Cas says after a full minute of silence, and it’s flat and cold and it hurts Dean inside and out.
“Jesus Christ,” he snaps, and then he glances back - Mary’s still asleep. He lowers his voice. “Of course I fucking trust you. You’re family, okay? I trust you with my goddamn life.”
I trusted you with my brother’s, he’s about to add, but then he remembers where Sammy is and what they're doing to him, and Cas’ enough of a dumbass to think that’s on him, and hell, he just said he does think that’s on him, so Dean keeps his mouth shut.
“‘S just,” he says instead, hoping he can make sense here, because one thing he doesn’t want to do is he doesn’t want to screw this up - to hurt Cas - but he needs to get this out. “I don’t know how it works, do I? Who’s fucking listening, an’ all.”
Cas doesn’t say anything to that, and Dean’s heart shrinks a little more.
“Come on,” he says, tightening his hands on the wheel. “There’s so much we don’t fucking know. Look at these English bitches - at the damn weapons they’ve got. And how do I know someone out there ain’t got a way to hack into - into -”
“Into my brain?” Cas suggests, and his voice may be thawing, but only just.
“A way to tap into prayers,” Dean amends. “Sounds like something Lucifer would do, and he’s got control over Hell now, right?”
A short pause.
“It’s likely.”
Dean steals a glance to Cas - at his sharp, angry profile - and fiddles with the radio until he finds another station, because these happy, jazzy tunes are grating on his nerves.
They drive on without speaking, Dean’s mind spinning and spinning and landing on worry and dead ends and dread at every point, because what if Sammy’s seriously hurt (what if he’s -), and how could those brass knuckles take down Cas - Dean was always so damn worried about both of them he could barely function, and now he's worried about Mom too, and what the hell is he supposed to tell her about - about anything? About Dad, and going to Hell, and Sammy and Lucifer? About him and Cas?
No that there’s anything to tell anyone there, and the thought is almost grey with bitterness and lost chances.
A truckers’ bar appears and disappears on their left, and by its pink and golden light Dean looks at his mother through the mirror, and then, inevitably, back at Cas.
(His messy hair; the curve of his badly shaven jaw.)
“You okay there?” he asks, in a low voice, just as some sandpapery Bob Dylan song comes on the radio.
Cas sighs.
“I’m worried about Sam. I wish he would pray to me,” he says, bowing his head.
“Yeah. Me too.”
Fucking Sammy. Always needs to play the fucking hero.
But our chances really was a million to one, Bob says. Dean fiddles with the radio again, turns down the volume with a quick, stilted movement.
“I wanted to,” he suddenly blurts out, putting his right hand on the seat, two inches from Cas’ thigh. “Pray to you, I mean.”
More silence, and then -
“I know,” and this is it - Cas’ voice is Cas’ voice again, soft and warm around Dean’s heart.
“What do you mean, you knew?”
“I heard that. I heard -” Cas stops, takes a deep breath. “You seemed lonely.”
Oh, crap. Cas can hear longing. Dean’s always forgetting about that.
“I thought the message came - that you were on a - different plane,” Cas adds, a bit unsteadily, and Dean wishes that they could just stop in a motel and watch cartoons all night.
(That he could lean against Cas’ shoulder, fall asleep like that, cherished and safe.)
“Well, it didn’t.”
“No. Of course not.”
“And, buddy,” Dean coughs, and finally moves his hand, patting Cas’ chest, once, like he’s some goddamn football coach, “I really did want to pray to you. I missed you.”
He can see, out of the corner of his eye, Cas turning to look at him.
“You were gone one day,” he points out.
Dean almost rolls his eyes, because he’s trying here, okay? And if Cas could just stop being himself for one goddamn second -
“So?”
“Nothing,” Cas says, after a full minute of silence; and then: “I missed you too.”
Again, there’s something more under these words, and Dean has to focus very hard on the dark road ahead of him to ignore it - to push it all to one side - all those Let’s not die on each other again and All I want is for you to be safe and All I want is for you to be happy and mostly that very loud I’m not going anywhere - whether you want me or not, you have me that Cas’ been shouting at him ever since he walked into a ruined room and allowed Dean to beat him within an inch of his life, because he can’t think about those things now, because Sammy’s in danger and this day’s not about what Dean wants; because no day ever is.
“Hey,” Dean says, licking his lips, “wanna drive her for a bit? I could do with some z’s.”
Yeah, this is all he can say right now; and he hopes Cas gets it. He glances to his right, catches Cas staring right at him, something between surprise and fondness on his face.
“Of course,” he says, and, Dean breathes out, relaxes back into his seat and slows down, because, surely, dawn can’t be that far ahead of them now.