Archive of Our Own ^beta

Dean’s mom said the hotel room wasn’t meant to be home. But Dean was six years old, and he didn’t yet have a full grasp on what ‘home’ meant. ‘Home’ was where Daddy was, but then Mom said they were leaving. There was less shouting through the walls after that.

Home was a peaceful place. Yes.

Quiet.

Their hotel room was six floors up, and they had to take an elevator to get there. Dean carried one of the brown grocery bags, looking up to watch his reflection on the mirror ceiling. His eyes were the same green as the spinach that rested on his freckled cheek.

“Wheeee,” said Sam, carried on Mom’s hip. Dean had said he could carry Sam, but Mom trusted him with the spinach and potatoes, so that was okay. Sam liked being higher up anyway, and Dean was too short.

The elevator dinged, and the brass doors drew open with a hefty grumble and a thump. Dean marched out first, carrying his bag with his arms wrapped around its middle. Mom went ahead, one hand around a grocery bag and the other around Sam, while her fingers reached for the keycard in the pocket of her jeans.

The three of them came to the white door of their room, but then Dean heard a flip and the sound of something small hitting the carpet.

“Oh, damn,” Mom said. “Dean, could you get the keycard for me? I dropped it.”

Dean was about to put the grocery bag down, but someone else bent in front of him and picked up the keycard from beside Mom’s loafers. The boy put the card into Mom’s hand, and Mom said “Thanks, honey,” without realising it wasn’t Dean.

Dean blinked, watching the other boy step back. He had floppy brown hair that went in his blue eyes, and he looked thoughtful, eyes trained on Dean. He wore checkered pajama bottoms and a dark grey t-shirt that was much too big for him.

Dean was distracted as Mom opened the door, and he glanced forward, then back to the boy, then he headed into the hotel room. Mom turned the kitchen light on, and Dean peered back over his shoulder. He was surprised to see the boy following him inside.

“You don’t live here,” Dean said to him, in case he had the wrong room. “Number six-oh-four is our room.”

The boy blinked at him, long black eyelashes casting shadows over his tan cheeks. He didn’t say anything.

Mom put Sam down on the lacquered wood and he toddled off to play with the fridge magnets. Mom then put her grocery bag on the kitchen countertop and sighed, turning around with a tired look in her eyes. “Dean, close the door please—” Her eyes opened wide, and her hand paused halfway towards pushing her bangs off her forehead. “Who’re you?! Where’d you come from?”

“He picked up the keycard,” Dean said, going to lift his grocery bag next to the other one. It fell over and the potatoes rolled away, off the other side and onto the floor, but Dean didn’t get told off, because Mom had gone straight past him to crouch beside the other boy.

“What’s your name?” Mom asked, pushing the door closed without looking at it. “Is your mom staying in this hotel?”

The boy stared at her, his eyes moving back and forth between each of her eyes. He blinked once and didn’t speak.

Mom put her hands on her knees and pushed herself up tall, then turned around. Dean saw the bewildered frown between her eyebrows. “I’m going to call the front desk, find out if anyone’s called in a missing kid.”

“He’s my age,” Dean said. He looked between the boy and Mom, not sure who he was meant to direct his observation to. Mom wasn’t really listening, she was washing her hands and reaching for the phone with her gaze and her thoughts. The boy was probably listening but he didn’t respond.

Mom finally dried her hands and went to get the phone, shaking her head and muttering as she dialled a number read off a piece of paper. She lifted the phone to her ear and ran a hand over her forehead, resting it on the top of her head like she did when she looked at a big problem and tried to figure out where to start fixing it.

Dean went back to the boy, and smiled when he peered back at him. “I’m Dean,” Dean said. He thrust out his hand for the boy to shake. “I’m in first grade.”

The boy looked at the hand and reached to touch it, but rather than shaking, he turned it over and looked at Dean’s palm. A fingertip with an unclipped nail touched the criss-cross grooves in Dean’s palm, and Dean realised the boy was pointing at the dirt on Dean’s hand.

“It’s just dirt,” Dean said reassuringly. “It’s clean.”

The boy looked irritated by that, his eyebrows drawing together.

Dean huffed. “You’re worse than Mom.” He stomped across the kitchen floor, towards the bathroom. He didn’t touch the light switch, but it was bright enough from the kitchen that he could see. He stood on his tiptoes and washed his fingertips.

Then he turned the tap off, turned around—

The boy was standing right behind Dean, and he looked annoyed again. The boy got the big plastic steps from beside the toilet and pushed them up to the sink, and shoved Dean towards the steps. Dean sighed and climbed up, now too tall for the sink. He washed his hands properly this time. With soap and everything.

He could still hear his mother in the kitchen, chatting on the phone with a tone of concern.

He finished drying his hands, then stepped back down to the bathroom tiles. The other boy looked satisfied now. He took Dean’s hand from beside his thigh and shook it, putting on a small smile.

“Come on,” Dean said. He left the bathroom and went to find Sam. He discovered the two-year-old attempting to climb up the couch, so he pushed Sammy up by his diaper-padded butt, and smiled when Sam huffed and turned around.

“Nuw. Doin it mysalf,” Sam said.

Dean stuck out his tongue, and grinned when Sam stuck his tongue out too.

Dean turned to the round-faced boy and stuck his tongue out again.

The boy narrowed his eyes, then ever-so-slowly poked his pink tongue out from between his lips. He looked down at his own tongue, going cross-eyed. Dean giggled, and felt his cheek pudge pushing against his eyes when the boy looked at him and smiled confusedly. He seemed pleased that Dean was laughing.

Mom’s voice turned impatient, and Dean’s smile fell. “No, no, he’s in the hotel room,” she said. “Yes, in this hotel, the Women’s Refuge! I didn’t kidnap him, he walked right in here!” She pressed her fingers against the inside corners of her eyes and sighed. “Look, let me speak to your manager.” She sighed again and tapped her fingers on the kitchen counter, lower lip tucking over her bottom teeth.

It was quiet for a bit, and Mom’s eyes wandered over to Sam and Dean and the boy. She gave them a smile, and Dean smiled back.

“Oh, yes, hi!” Mom seemed brighter, speaking with renewed purpose. There was a brief pause, then Mom continued, “Yael? Oh, that’s a lovely name. I’m Mary. Look, there’s a little boy who followed me and my sons into our room, I was wondering whether he’s staying at this hotel, or if I need to call the police.” She paused, then looked over at the boy. “Um, he’s about six. Dark hair.” Another pause. “Room six-oh-four.”

She grinned all of a sudden, and ducked her head. “Six-oh-five? Thank God, okay. Yeah, that’s no problem. We’ll take him over right now.”

“No,” Dean complained, realising what that meant. “Mom, I wanna keep him!”

Mom frowned, pressing a hand over the phone receiver for a moment. “Dean, he’s not a stray cat!” She looked down and spoke into the phone again, “Hang on, sorry, I didn’t catch that last part?”

Dean liked the stray cat idea. He beamed at the boy, reaching to pet his head and ruffle his hair. “Kitty,” he said.

The boy blinked curiously, tilting his head. Dean laughed, then hopped off the couch and ran to the kitchen. He pulled a bowl out of the cupboard and milk out of the fridge, and trickled a half-inch of white liquid into the bowl. Then he put the milk back, closed the fridge, and went to get cookies from the other cupboard. He put three of his favourite kind (chocolate chip!) into the milk, and carried it carefully out of the kitchen and back into the tiny living room. The kitchen light wasn’t bright enough to make the milk glow from all the way over here, but it shimmered at the edges, a grey film coating the sides of the bowl where the milk slopped around.

Dean put the bowl down next to the boy, and pushed Sammy’s face back when he tried to lean off the couch. “No, Sam, that’s for Kitty,” Dean said. He turned to the boy and nudged the bowl closer. “Eat your din-din, Kitty.”

The boy crossed his legs and put his fingers on one cookie, lifting it. Dribbles of white trailed down his wrist and dripped back into the bowl. The boy’s mouth hung open, eyes wide as he observed the way the cookie disintegrated in his hand and plopped back to the bowl in giant splashes.

The boy closed his eyes and put what was left of the cookie into his mouth, and he pulled his fingers out one by one, smacking his lips as he tasted milk and cookies together.

Dean’s mouth watered; he wanted a cookie too. He reached for one, but a warm, tightly-gripping hand grasped his wrist. Dean inhaled sharply and looked up at Kitty. Kitty hissed.

Dean pouted.

Sam laughed. “Dean, ‘s Kitty’s food. Dun eat Kitty’s food.”

Dean retracted his hand, sulking as Kitty picked up his bowl and shielded it with his body, fingers dipping into the milk again to pick out a second cookie. It fell apart at once, and Kitty looked disappointed.

Dean forgot he was grumpy. “Lift it to your mouth and drink it,” he said to Kitty. “It’s soup!”

Kitty did as Dean said, and shut his eyes in bliss as the thick, sugary mush slid into his mouth and he tasted it all, swallowing slowly in tiny, measured sips.

Soon the bowl was empty, and Dean nodded once. Kitty had now been fed. Job well done.

Mom ended the phone call and crouched beside Dean, looking at Kitty over Dean’s shoulder. “You ready to go back home, Castiel?”

“No, he’s Kitty,” Dean said.

“The manager said his name’s Castiel,” Mom corrected. “Castiel lives right across the hall – don’t you?”

Kitty – Castiel – shrugged. He looked down at his dirty socks, holding his toes with his hands.

Dean crawled over to Mom and leaned in to whisper in her ear, one hand cupped so Castiel couldn’t see him speaking. “I don’t think they have cookies over there, Mom.”

Mom bit her lip, but she didn’t look as shocked as Dean thought she would. Mom swallowed, then picked up the empty bowl and stood up to walk away. Dean watched her put the bowl in the sink, then she bent down and got something out of the cupboard. Its packet crinkled, and she came back with the whole pack of cookies in her hands.

“You can take these home with you,” she said to Castiel, handing him the half-empty packet.

“But those are ours,” Dean said.

“We can buy more,” Mom said, putting a hand on Dean’s head. “Come on, Castiel. It’s nearly bedtime, it’s already dark outside.”

Castiel looked at Dean for a while, lips parted, something slow and regretful in his eyes. But then he stood up and took Mom’s hand. Dean hurried to his feet too, reaching for Sam to pick him up and set him on his feet.

“Goin’ on a bear hunt, gonna catcha big one,” Sam sang, tottering after Dean as he pulled him along by his hand. Mom’s blonde hair was lit by the bright lights of the hallway now. She knocked on the door directly opposite room 604; she held tight to Castiel’s hand, making sure he didn’t get lost before they returned him.

Dean sidled up beside Castiel, looking over at his uneasy eyes. Dean whispered the next line of the Bear Hunt story to Castiel. “We’re not scared.”

Castiel looked scared, regardless.

Eventually the door to room 605 opened up, and a bedraggled-looking lady appeared. She was fair-skinned, her incredibly thin frame covered by a lacy nightdress like Mom’s, and she had long, black hair that was tangled all the way to her waist. She was rubbing at her face like she’s just woken up. “Yeah?” she asked, blinking at the shine of the lights just outside her door.

“Are you Castiel’s mom?” Dean’s mom asked.

The woman looked confused. “Yeah?” She looked back over her shoulder, then straight at Dean’s mom. “Why?”

Mom lifted her hand, showing the woman who was attached to it. The woman turned her eyes down towards her son, and looked doubly confused. “What— Why aren’t you in bed?!”

Castiel shuffled his socked feet, toes turned inwards.

Mom put her hand on Castiel’s hair and stroked him, and he became Kitty again for a few seconds. “He followed us into our room. He’s okay, I think perhaps he was just hungry.”

“I gave him dinner, he didn’t eat it,” the woman said sternly, grasping Castiel around the wrist and tugging him inside the dark hotel room. “You are in big trouble, you little—” The woman snatched the packet of cookies out of his hands and handed it to Mom. “He doesn’t eat these.”

Dean clung to Mom’s waist, looking up at her and wanting her to correct the woman. Castiel liked cookies! But Mom pressed her lips together, accepting the cookie packet without argument. She took a breath to speak. “May I ask what day you intend to check out of this hotel?”

The woman got distracted, pushing Castiel back inside the hotel with her heel every time he tried to walk back out. “What? Oh, we’re long-term residents. Six months to a year— Castiel! Stop that right now or you won’t be getting your Christmas present!”

Dean was fairly certain Christmas wasn’t until December. It was September now, so that didn’t make a lot of sense.

Still, the threat seemed to work on Castiel. He shrunk back into the shadows, and Dean only saw a final glint of his blue eyes before he was swallowed up by the darkness of the room. Castiel’s mother sighed like getting her son back was a hassle she would rather not have to deal with. She looked up at Dean’s mom and put on a small, exhausted smile. “He’s a handful,” she said.

“Well, they all are,” Mom said, cradling the back of Dean’s head with a warm hand. Sam tugged and swung his weight on Dean’s hand as if to prove he was indeed a handful, but Dean pulled him back upright.

Something smashed in the darkness, and Castiel’s mom’s gaze shot back inside her room. “I have to go,” she said resignedly, running a badly manicured nail through her hair. “Thank you for bringing him back. And thank you for not calling the cops, I couldn’t go through that again. God.” She drifted away and slowly closed the door in Mom’s face.

The door clicked, and Dean heard a muffled angry shout.

Mom squeezed on Dean’s hand, then turned back to their own hotel room. Dean scurried after her, pulling Sammy along too and closing the door once they were back inside.

“Mom, why can’t he live with us?” Dean said, lifting Sam up onto the couch. “You’re much nicer than Kitty’s mom is.”

“She’s doing her best,” Mom said testily, slamming open a kitchen drawer and scraping around for a utensil. “All mothers are, that’s what we do. That’s why we’re here.”

“But,” Dean said, keeping Sam from tumbling off the couch arm. “But...”

He didn’t have a counter-argument just yet.

“Buh buh buh buh blue,” Sam said. “A – B – C – D!”

Mom clattered and thumped in the kitchen, preparing to make dinner with more force than was necessary. “Go and get Sam ready for bed, Dean.”

“Okay,” Dean said, picking up his little brother with both arms. “Time for a bath, Sammy.” He carried him to the bathroom, still thinking about his Kitty.

When it was Dean’s bedtime, he tiptoed up to his bed and turned the small lamp on so the big light wouldn’t disturb Sammy. Sammy slept nearer the couch, where the boring creamy wall beside his crib was livened up by Christmas decorations – baubles, tinsel and a tiny painted reindeer, all dangling from a coat hanger. They’d been there since April.

Mom followed Dean to his bed and sat down next to his legs. Dean didn’t get cool superhero bedcovers like the other kids at school said they had; his ones were beige with white tucked down over the top. Hotels didn’t have superheroes in the laundry room.

Mom didn’t read anything to Dean tonight, she said it was too late and Dean was too tired. Dean’s eyes agreed: they were stinging and prickling like he had shampoo in them.

Mom stroked Dean’s hair back off his forehead, raking her fingers through the golden locks. “I’m glad you found a new friend today,” she said quietly.

“I call him Kitty,” Dean said sleepily, pulling his teddy closer. “After school tomorrow, can I go over and play?”

Mom smiled, but she pressed her lips together, which meant it wasn’t a real smile. “Hmmm. Maybe.”

Dean blinked against the pillowcase to keep his eyes open. “Or Kitty can come and play here?”

“We’ll have to see what Castiel’s mom thinks. But there’s no harm in asking, I suppose.”

“She should say yes,” Dean decided. He looked down at his teddy and gave it a squeeze. “Kitties need someone to play with. I can be a good influence on him!”

Mom laughed, crinkles appearing beside her eyes. “I’m sure his mom will appreciate that.” She chuckled, then leaned down and put a warm kiss on Dean’s forehead. “We’ll talk about this again tomorrow. Night-night, Dean.”

“Night-night.”

Once Mom turned off the light, Dean’s eyes adjusted enough to see the glow-in-the-dark dinosaur stuck to his clock. The dinosaur rapidly blurred out of existence, and he fell asleep within a single minute. Feeding lost cats was officially hard work.

“Dean! Dean, I need ice, quickly. Quick as a bunny!”

Dean calmed his too-fast breaths, but he was still dizzy. He couldn’t bear seeing hot chocolate sauce dripping off Sammy’s knee and onto the kitchen floor, he couldn’t bear the sound of his screams. Mom was kneeling with Sammy in her arms, wiping a tea cloth over the burn.

“Dean, listen to me,” Mom said urgently. Dean swallowed and looked into Mom’s eyes. That reassuring stare gave him the strength he’d need to process her instructions. He nodded, and Mom went on: “Go out of this room, turn left, then left again, and put a dime into the ice machine. Okay? You’ll need a bucket.”

Dean nodded, and nodded again, rushing to the bathroom to get the small plastic bucket his bath toys were kept in. He tipped the toys into the tub and rushed back out, accepting the two five-cent coins Mom gave him from her pocket.

“Hurry, Dean.”

Dean flung open the front door and ignored when it bumped on the wall; he turned left and ran down the fancy floral carpet in his bare feet and pyjamas. He turned left again and came to the tiny alcove where the vending machines were kept. He’d gotten a soda before, but Mom had been there to show him how. He didn’t know how the ice machine worked.

He looked at the instructions on the front, but he wasn’t extremely good at reading like the other children in his class, and words were so much harder to read when his mind was full of Sammy’s screams. He could still hear his high-pitched wails carrying down the hall.

Dean guessed at what he had to do, finding the slot for the money. He put in one nickel, and it rattled and clumped and clinked as it went inside and hit the other coins in its belly. But the second nickel slipped out of Dean’s hand and fell on the carpet, rolling straight under the machine.

“Oh no,” he muttered, falling to his knees, stretching out his fingers to reach the coin. He couldn’t get it – he couldn’t even see it through the carpet dust.

“You’re doing it wrong,” came a young voice. Dean sat up and looked over his shoulder, and saw Castiel standing there. He was wearing the same clothes as the day before, and his skinny arms were folded across his chest.

Dean gaped at him, stunned that the other boy knew how to speak. Then he heard Sam crying, and all his own words flooded out at once. “Sammy’s hurt! I need ice or he’ll swell up like a balloon and he won’t stop crying!”

“You’re doing it wrong,” Castiel repeated, this time in a lighter tone. He went up to Dean’s side and passed the ice machine, going to the snack machine instead.

“Ice! Not candy, I need ice!”

Castiel ignored him and punched his thumb repeatedly against the snack machine’s keypad. He paused after a moment, turned to Dean and took his bucket, then put it against the snack machine’s side, below the well where the change usually came out. He continued pressing various buttons, and Dean started to get even more anxious, and anxiety was soon followed by annoyance at Castiel for slowing him down.

But all of a sudden, the snack machine made a terrible rumbling noise, and began to spew its coins into the bucket like a silver and bronze waterfall. Dean’s eyes widened, and he sat mesmerised by the endless noise as the coins coated the base of the bucket, then began piling up. Castiel’s hand began to shake, unable to hold the weight of all the coins – so Dean rushed to help, holding the bucket from underneath. He panted as the bucket filled closer and closer to the rim – it was only a small bucket – and he worried if it might spill over, but the flow cut off with two inches of bucket space to spare. Castiel scooped out the last coins from the collection well and put them in the bucket, ignoring the quarters that fell on the carpet.

Dean felt like he was holding a million dollars. He’d never seen this many coins.

“Ice,” Castiel reminded him.

Dean gasped and put down the bucket, then picked out a single five-cent coin from the top. He put it in the ice machine, and pressed the big button that said ‘ICE’.

The ice machine gurgled, and started to hum – and just as alarmingly as the snack machine had, it began to eject ice lumps from its spout. Dean yelped and jumped back, leaving Castiel to rush in and stick the bucket of coins under the opening. Ice shot into the bucket and bounced back out at the force, but some lumps stayed where they were thrown, and soon there was a small white mountain on top of the coins. More ice destroyed the mountain and knocked it all over the carpet, but a new mountain was erected in its place.

The last of the ice fell out of the machine and rolled away across the carpet. Dean made a sound of triumph, but when he went to lift the bucket, he found it would be impossible to raise the carry-handle without decapitating the mountain again.

“Push,” Castiel said, putting two hands on the side of the bucket and straightening his legs. Dean arranged himself into the same position, and they pushed the bucket along the carpet, navigating their plastic ship through a red sea of icebergs and silver islands.

Dean started to crawl halfway back to the hotel room; his legs ached. He shuffled along and pushed while Castiel pushed beside him.

They bumped over the metal carpet divider between the hallway and Dean’s hotel room, jingling the coins, thankfully only losing a few lumps of ice. Sam had stopped crying by now, but Dean could hear his quiet sobs and Mom’s soothing hushes.

Dean and Castiel rounded the kitchen counter, but Mom wasn’t there.

“Bathroom,” she called, having heard the bucket scooting along the wooden floor.

Dean and Castiel pushed the bucket into the bathroom. Mom looked up from where she was sitting with Sam in the bath, running water over the burn, and relief flooded her expression. “Bring it here,” she said, reaching out a hand.

Dean went to fetch her a new tea cloth to wrap the ice in, because it was going to melt very quickly if it was put straight on Sammy’s skin. Dean heard Sam whine when the ice touched him. Dean had had injuries like that before: ice would make it less painful once Sam got used to it.

Dean gave Mom the tea cloth, and she thanked him. Sam was puffy-eyed and red in the face, but sniffled bravely as Dean touched his overheating head.

Dean turned around to see where Castiel had gone, and saw he was waiting in the doorway, observing the goings-on very closely. Dean gave him a smile. Castiel glanced at him for just long enough to smile back, then returned his attention to Sam.

Mom never took enough ice to see the coins in the bucket, so Dean and Castiel didn’t get in trouble with the hotel manager for tampering with the vending machine and making a mess of melted ice on the carpet. Someone in charge noticed the missing coins, though, and they probably switched the code later that day, because Castiel tried to teach Dean the code the following day but it didn’t work. Castiel was very put-out, but Dean said it was okay, it didn’t matter, because Castiel had saved Sam’s life with his trick. That was probably an exaggeration, but it made Castiel feel better.

It was actually kind of great, knowing Castiel. Now the ice was broken – so to speak – it became a lot easier for Dean to go over to the other hotel room and knock on the door, and ask very politely if Castiel might want to play for a while before dinnertime.

Castiel was a bit wild, even Mom thought so, and she didn’t know what Castiel did when he was alone with Dean. He spat off the hotel balcony and tried to hit one of the maids’ cleaning carts, but his aim wasn’t that good yet. Dean didn’t tell Mom about their spitting contest; she was fussed enough about the ten bottles of shampoo Dean and Castiel had stolen off one of those same carts. On the one hand, she really did need more shampoo, but on the other hand, she said it wasn’t good etiquette not to ask first.

“But the bottles are so small,” Dean said. “If you only take one like you’re meant to, you’ll run out again.”

“That’s not the point,” Mom said, but she never did say what the point was.

It was almost Christmas, Dean could tell by the tinsel all around the corners of the elevator, and the themed music which played from the speakers. The tinsel reflected spiky golden light across the mirror, and when Castiel looked up too, it put golden light on his face as well. Dean pressed the button for the first floor and grinned up at his friend’s reflection, feeling the dip in his tummy as the elevator started falling.

But then the elevator jolted, and came to sudden stop. Dean and Castiel fell to the floor with a thump.

Dean got up first and helped Castiel to his feet. “Elevator’s stuck,” he explained. “We’re probably gonna be hanging around for a while, Mom and me sang along to the music last time.”

Castiel was round-eyed with fear, his pink lips drawn back in a nervous gape. Dean had never seen him scared before.

“It’s okay,” Dean insisted. “Sing! Dooo they know it’s Christmas tiiiiime at alll—”

Castiel whined and sat down on the hard floor, wrapping his arms around his legs. “Nooo.”

Dean sat down next to him, putting a hand on his shoulder. “Cas, what’s wrong?”

Castiel buried his nose between his knees, making an unhappy noise. “Don’t like— Small. I wanna get out.”

Dean squeezed his bony shoulder reassuringly, concerned for his friend. “If you close your eyes you could pretend we’re somewhere big.”

Castiel shook his head firmly, eyes already shut. He was breathing too hard, his teeth clenched together. He started rocking forwards and backwards, small whimpers escaping his throat. Then he started to growl, fingers clutching his hair so tight Dean wondered if he might rip it out.

“Cas,” Dean said. “Cas... you’re scaring me...”

Castiel shivered and wrapped both arms over his head, sobbing a muffled noise into his ripped jeans. “Wanna go ouuut, please, please, please—”

“It won’t be long, I promise,” Dean whispered. “I just have to— Oh!” He stood up and ran to the panel at the side of the elevator, searching for the special button. There was one to open the doors, but before he could find that, he tried pressing the button for the first floor again. “Just gotta remind it we want to go somewhere,” Dean said in relief as the button made the lift come back to life, and the mechanisms all around made a lot of noise before sending them on their way, descending to the first floor.

Castiel gasped and stood up, slapping away tears from his ruddy cheeks, eyes watching the dial over the elevator doors slip from ‘5’ through to ‘1’.

By the time Dean had returned to his side and reached out to hold his hand, the doors were open. Castiel ran out and knelt on the floor of the lobby, kissing the carpet loudly, over and over.

“That’s gross,” Dean laughed, as Castiel stood up and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

Castiel gave Dean a watery smile. He brushed his fists against his eyes once more, then turned around and carried on, making his way across the lobby to watch the fish swim around their huge tanks.

It was over so quickly, neither of them realised that incident would come back to haunt them later.

Castiel woke up tangled in his sheets, hyperventilating and sweating wet, like he’d been swimming. The room was too small in the dark; he was choked by it. He turned to the side and slapped the button for his lamp, and light shot across the room, lighting his mother’s face in the next bed along.

He breathed out, reassured it was only a nightmare.

Castiel fell out of bed and crawled across the carpet, shivering, wondering if his mother would let him share her bed this time. He sat up and touched her bony face, feeling cold sweat in his palms. “Mamma,” he whispered, poking her cheek. “Mamma, I had another nightmare.”

She groaned and batted his hand away, wincing at the light. “Baby... Bluhhh, go b... back to bed.”

“Can I sleep with you?”

“No.” Mamma turned away, pulling the blankets with her. “Turn the light out, Castiel,” she slurred. “I have a fourteen-hour shift in the morning.”

Castiel turned the light off obediently, but he didn’t want to get back into his own bed. The sheets were too clingy, and he knew as soon as his head touched the pillow he would be back in that elevator, suffocated by brass walls as they shook and groaned, closing in on him until he was squished up into a tiny meat cube.

He backed away and crawled into his mother’s bed, but she shifted sharply, pushing him back out. “No, Castiel. You’re not four years old any more... You need to deal with th... these things yourself.” She yawned heavily, hands moving to fan her hair out over her pillow.

Castiel stood there in silence, staring longingly at the empty place in the bed that glowed a vague blue, lit by the small amount of moonlight coming through the patterned curtain. He waited and waited, hoping his mother would fall back asleep so he could sneak in beside her.

She did doze off eventually, but she also rolled into the empty part of the bed. Castiel fidgeted, wondering if she would mind if he crept in by her feet.

He decided against it; last time he’d done that he hadn’t been allowed to watch TV in case he got another nightmare. But it wasn’t the TV that caused his nightmares – it didn’t matter what happened to him or what he saw, there was always something to scare him at night.

Still, he’d never been afraid of the dark. He went over to the TV and crawled on his hands and knees until he could reach behind the cabinet. He pulled out a master keycard that he’d hidden there, the kind the maids used. It could get him into any room in the hotel. He sat back on his heels, put the card in his pyjama pocket, then stood up and headed for the door.

He opened and shut the door with practiced silence; even the last click at the end could have been mistaken for a drip in the bathroom sink. The hallway was brightly lit. It was always this bright, even in the middle of the night.

Castiel put the master keycard into the slot on Dean’s door, waited until the reader’s light blinked green, then he pulled out the card and let himself inside, stealthy as the darkness itself.

He looked around. He’d never seen this room in complete darkness, but he stood for a minute and allowed his eyes to adjust. He knew it was a mirror image of his and his mother’s room: there was a couch on the right with its back to the wall, opposite the TV. To the left there was a very tiny kitchen, then the door to the bathroom. Directly ahead of Castiel there were two beds: the one on the left was Dean’s mom’s bed, and the other one was Dean’s. Sam’s crib was next along to the right, beside the couch, and his Christmas-decoration mobile twirled above, pushed by the slightest breeze.

Once he could see the outline of each bed, Castiel went straight ahead to Dean’s.

He stood by the nightstand, squinting through the gloom to see the snub-nosed, freckled face of his friend. Castiel hadn’t seen him asleep before, discounting accidental naps. He looked very cosy, all tucked up under his blanket. Castiel felt the residual fear from his nightmare draining away, and he went on staring at Dean, feeling comforted. Dean’s lips were open against his pillow, and he was probably drooling.

He looked very cute like that. Castiel leaned in and gave his warm cheek a little kiss, perhaps as a thank-you for making him feel better.

Dean stirred at the touch. “Mm?”

“It’s me, Dean,” Castiel whispered, quiet enough that Dean’s mom wouldn’t hear. “I had a nightmare.”

Dean blinked his bleary eyes open, a careless hand flopping into his face to push away his sleepiness. “Cas?”

“Can I sleep with you?”

Dean took a while to respond, still half-asleep. Eventually he muttered and hummed a sound of agreement, reaching out a lazy hand to touch Castiel’s tummy. He poked him gently, then the hand relaxed; he had fallen back asleep.

Castiel went around the bed to the other side and crawled in behind Dean; there was a lot more space behind him than in front of him. Castiel sighed and stretched out, wriggling his toes in the cool sheets. Dean was nice and warm, radiating heat. Castiel turned towards him and watched him breathe, inhaling until his lungs were full, then out through his pouty lips.

Castiel’s eyes became heavy, and soon, consciousness escaped him in a way it never had before: without him noticing.

They went to Castiel’s place for an early dinner on Friday. It was supposed to be a Christmas celebration, but it was nothing like what Dean had expected. Christmas for Dean had always been roast dinner and party favours and the smell of mulled wine, decorations of golden and red and forest fir green. At Castiel’s place, it was quiet and drab – no more fancy than a regular day – and there was an awful lot of talk about someone’s father, that Jesus guy, and some ghosts full of holes.

Dean tugged on Mom’s sleeve every five minutes to ask if it was time to eat yet, but Mom shushed him and carried on listening to Castiel’s mom ask the ceiling for forgiveness and guidance.

Dean turned his eyes towards Castiel, but Castiel had his palms pressed together, fingertips by his nose, and he kept his eyes squeezed shut; he seemed more absorbed by what was happening than Dean had been that time he’d found a James Bond movie on TV. It was kinda weird.

Dean amused himself by playing with Sammy, holding his tiny hands, lifting up his legs with Sam sitting on his ankles. It all had to stop when Sam got excited though; he chortled too loud and Castiel’s mom shot them a dark look, which made Dean’s stomach feel cold and horrible.

They sat in silence for a while, and Dean counted all the things in the room that were blue. His jeans (Mom ironed them specially for today), Castiel’s suit (he was wearing a suit... but he didn’t look like James Bond), the plastic plates that held some odd-looking dry bread and dates, and five of the eighteen stacks of paper placed around the room. And Castiel’s eyes.

Dean gave Cas a wide smile, aware two of his teeth were missing so he probably looked like a complete dork. Castiel gave a shy smile back, glancing over at his mother to check she wasn’t looking before he let his palms separate. They’d been pressed together for a good fifteen minutes.

Castiel and Dean conducted a silent conversation about food, and Dean was relieved to discover that, yes, there was turkey coming up later.

When Castiel’s mom finally finished praying, Dean, Cas and Sam had to say “Amen” as well. Dean didn’t know what the word meant, but it seemed to herald the arrival of turkey from the kitchen, so he had no complaints to make.

Dean listened to the adults talking while they ate; his mouth was too full to participate at present.

“I run a print factory,” Castiel’s mom said. Her name was Johanna, but she wanted Dean and Cas to call her Auntie Jo. “People come in at all hours and ask us to print things. We’ve been doing greetings cards lately; the workday’s gotten mad.”

“You employ other people, don’t you?” Mom asked, cutting up Sam’s smoked turkey into bite-size pieces. “Seems strange you’re having to do all the work.”

Auntie Jo frowned and nodded slowly, dipping her head over and over.

Castiel spoke with his mouth full. “I think what Mamma said didn’t come out right. She doesn’t own the company, she’s a sec-ret-ar-y.” He looked over at his mother, who wouldn’t meet his eyes. “She writes down what people want printed. And she types up instructions for other people to do it. And she posts letters. And sometimes she brings free paper home. It’s always covered in ink blotches though, so it’s no good for drawing on.”

Auntie Jo pressed her lips tightly together, cutting up her own turkey into bits even smaller than Sam’s. She didn’t seem to want to eat.

Mom looked cautiously between Auntie Jo and Castiel, then finally directed a question at Auntie Jo. “How long have you been working there?”

“Six years,” Castiel said proudly, before his mother could open her mouth. “Her last job kicked her out because she got pregnant with me. So she raised me all on her own. My dad travels a lot, so that’s why I haven’t met him.” He put some long green beans in his mouth and munched on them.

“Our dad wasn’t safe to be around,” Dean said to Castiel. “So we left and came here. It’s like a spy movie.”

Mom made an unexplained sound of discomfort, but when Dean looked her way, she looked normal. She put Sam on the floor to slobber on his turkey by himself, and Dean finished his own turkey and took some more.

It was quiet for a while. Auntie Jo didn’t eat a thing.

“So,” Mom said to break the long silence. “Um, out of curiosity, how long is your average workday?”

She turned to Auntie Jo for her answer, and Auntie Jo offered a bland smile. “Twelve hours or more, most days. It’s theoretically sedentary work, but in practice? Not so much.”

Mom already knew that, Dean had heard her complaining about it to her friend Anna over the phone. Who looks after Castiel? she’d muttered. She’s out all day working and the poor kid’s sitting alone in an empty room! He’s six, as well! No wonder he’s so disturbed. Dean had peered around the corner at that point and Mom had seen him, and she’d ended the phone call so hastily Dean had come to suspect he wasn’t supposed to have heard.

Putting down her plate of turkey, Mom made Auntie Jo a very significant, life-changing offer. “If you don’t have someone around to look after Castiel... I’d be happy to. Before and after school; at the weekends. I can drop him at school if you need me to. Any time you’re not available. Honestly. He’s a joy to have around.”

While Dean struggled to keep in his shout of excitement, Auntie Jo seemed flabberghasted. “A joy?” she repeated in a small voice. “Are you sure we’re talking about the same Castiel?”

Castiel seemed to shrink inside his suit, but his eyes darted hopefully to Dean’s mom.

Mom laughed in that delightful way she did when something really touched her heart. “Of course,” she said, eyes crinkled at the corners. “Dean’s never made a friend quite like him.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Auntie Jo said warily, eyes taking in Dean’s unusually tidy form, then Castiel’s. “Baby, is that something you would be interested in?”

Castiel nodded eagerly, his food forgotten. “Please may I?”

Auntie Jo deliberated for some time.

She seemed more reluctant than Dean would have hoped, or expected. Maybe she was uneasy with the thought that Castiel might wriggle his way into Dean’s family and stay there. Dean wondered if there was something terrible about Castiel that he didn’t know yet – but then he remembered how much adults didn’t like spitting, or running in the hallways, or peeing in places that weren’t the toilet, or climbing onto the roof at two o’clock in the morning, or stealing, or vandalism; basically all the things Cas liked doing for fun. Dean liked that Castiel was uncontrollable and bizarre and kind of scary at times. After being around him, Dean’s teddy bear felt even softer, and yet, there was something similarly comforting about the other boy’s hugs.

Auntie Jo finally gave a sigh and a nod, and then a laugh of relief. She looked up at Dean’s mom and smiled, a particular sort of smile which Dean had only ever seen on this mother’s face before: total and utter gratitude. “Thank you, Mary,” she said, in a voice shattered by emotion.

Mom reached to grasp her hand, and whispered, “Oh, please, no. It’s nothing. You’re welcome.”

Dean caught Castiel’s eye and they both grinned.

Perhaps everyone here had been given a gift, the kind that couldn’t be decorated in fancy paper. The knowledge that Cas would be around Dean practically every day now made him so utterly, utterly glad, it turned the boring dinner into a magical Christmas all by itself.

Dean’s mom was awesome. Pure and simple.

Because Dean was only six years old, time took forever to pass. Even with a routine – wake up, bathroom, change Sammy’s diaper so Mom gets five more minutes of rest, breakfast, meet Cas in the lobby and drive to school (interaction with other human beings, lunch), collect Cas from his school, get home, play with Cas, dinner, bath and bed – the days passed by for Dean like every day was a whole new life.

Castiel was part of that life. He was as much a part of Dean’s everyday process as the dinosaur sticker on his clock or the floppy felt ears on his doggy slippers. Castiel was fun to see every day, and things weren’t done properly unless he came over for dinner on Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays, and they all got an outing on Saturday afternoon.

Dean sometimes asked when they were going to see Daddy again, but Mom said that wasn’t going to happen. It wasn’t long until Daddy ceased to be part of Dean’s concept of home.

Castiel became part of Dean’s home instead. Somehow, in amongst all of his disorderly conduct, he provided the best sense of belonging Dean had ever had.

Mary’s car wasn’t one of those that sealed neatly around the doors, or had cushioned seats, or smelled like pine or strawberries or other such things. Mary didn’t mind sticking out like a sore thumb when it came time to drop her kids off at school; the biker dads probably appreciated seeing a fine muscle car cruising between the Hondas and the Toyotas and the Volvos, but that didn’t mean Mary used the car to flirt.

Driving a black 1967 Chevy Impala was her way of showing off. She’d had a Volkswagen bus growing up, much like everyone else. It had been cool at the time – everyone loves a hippie, right? – but she wasn’t as soft around the edges as she had been back then. Sure, she kept the long, blonde hair and the gentle denim fabric that flared out at her knees, but she liked to think her insides were dark and metallic nowadays. Sleek as a gleaming black side panel, tough as beat-up leather. She’d made it through hard times and come out the other side, and so had the car. She’d fixed the old girl up herself, so she knew.

Financially, the Impala was a money pit – it guzzled gas like nobody’s business, repair parts weren’t as readily available as she wished they were, and adding safety belts had cost a pretty penny – but who cared about that when her kids could safely say their car was badass to the extreme?

That was what she’d believed for years. Now Dean was seven years and one month old to the day, and apparently, in those seven years and one month, he’d formed his own opinions.

“I wish we had a cool car,” he said, keeping his faux leather jacket on when he put his safety belt across his chest. “Nobody else at school has one as noisy as ours. And theirs are good for the environment, we did it in class. Miss Grosby asked us what cars we had, and I said we had a Chevrully Impala, and she said it wasn’t good for the sky.”

Mary cranked the gear into drive and pulled slowly onto the right of the road, glancing into the rear-view mirror to see Dean gazing out of the window. “Miss Grosby’s right,” Mary said with a quick tilt of her head. “But at least it runs on diesel, which is still better than regular gasoline. It puts fewer bad fumes out into the atmosphere. This engine doesn’t seem to like the unleaded stuff though,” she sighed. “I should really get that checked out.”

They drove on, chatting about what Dean had learned in school. At one point Sam chimed in from the passenger seat and babbled about birds and pastry for a good two minutes. Mary understood Sam’s slurring less than Dean, so was thankful when Dean leaned forward in his seat at the red lights and engaged his younger brother in conversation for another minute.

They pulled up at Castiel’s school in the bus lane, and, as always, Castiel was the last one standing there. He opened the door to the back seat and climbed over Dean’s lap to sit on the other side. Dean pulled the door shut behind him.

Mary directed the car back into the road while Castiel was still buckling up. Dean coughed at him. “You smell like smoke,” Dean said.

Castiel didn’t say anything, but his jaw moved without parting his lips, and his eyes skimmed their way to look out of the window. Mary waited until they came to another set of traffic lights before she looked back over her shoulder – and sure enough, Castiel had soot-blackened fingers. Since knowing Dean, his aversion to having textured things on his hands had lessened considerably.

“Good science class?” she tested, putting on a smile to hide her inner worry.

“Yes,” Castiel said, after a pause. “We burned paper.”

“Cooool,” Dean said, craning towards Castiel and pulling on his safety belt until it clunked. “Your classes are awesome, how come I never get to do any of that stuff at my school? Hey, Mom, did you know Cas gets a class off every Friday? Everyone else has to take gym, but he gets to hang around in the teachers’ part of the building.”

“That’s for a counselling session, honey,” Mary said. For once she could be certain it wasn’t Castiel’s attempt to cut class: those counselling sessions had been board-mandated after the janitor had found Castiel cleaning the school bathrooms with bleach and steel wool, bare-handed. “Be glad you have to suffer through gym class, Dean. I don’t think Cas enjoys those sessions any more than you enjoy detention.”

Dean looked over at his friend, and Mary sensed but didn’t see Castiel’s awkward shrug of ‘she’s mostly right but I don’t want to say anything’.

Mary sighed. “Actually, Cas... I’m glad all you have to go through is some quiet talking and some special puzzles and things. The older you get, the more intense those sessions become. Trust me. They can help, but they’re no fun at all for some people. Six-year-olds have it easy compared to the rest of us.”

“I’m seven,” Castiel said.

Dean tutted. “You’ve been saying that forever. But you didn’t have a birthday so it doesn’t count.”

There was a quiet moment, in which Mary spun the car around a turning circle and headed into the gas station to get some fuel. She honked at a car that didn’t give way, then she sped across the junction before an eighteen-wheeler truck could cut her off.

When she paid attention to Dean and Castiel’s chatter again, she overheard Castiel saying, “—was born on February twenty-ninth. That only happens once every four years because of leap years. It doesn’t exist this year so I don’t have a birthday.”

Mary pulled up next to a gas pump and killed the engine before looking over her shoulder. “It’s February twenty-fourth today,” she said. “You’re saying it’s your birthday in five days? You can count your birthday as the twenty-eighth, as far as I’m concerned. It’s not fair to make you wait.”

Castiel glanced at her with his owlish eyes, then looked back down, sooty fingers plucking at his second-hand sweater. “Yeah,” he said. “I’m almost seven.”

Mary grinned. “Well, then. Are you having a party?”

Castiel shrugged. “Probably not having one this year,” he said casually. “Mamma’s got other stuff to do.”

Mary felt a jolt of sadness. God, it was heartbreaking when parents’ lives got in the way of their kids’ once-in-a-lifetime experiences. Castiel was so used to getting nothing that he wasn’t expecting anything. Shaking her head, Mary decided to fix it. “How about we have a party for you? You, me, Dean and Sammy – how about that? And you can invite your other friends too. And your mom, we wouldn’t want her to miss out!”

Castiel’s lips parted and his fingers clenched and his eyes became even wider. “I, um— Um, I think it’s okay,” he said. “If you just got me a present that would be fine, I don’t need a party.”

Mary raised her eyebrows. Was this about not having friends to invite? Because she could see that being a legitimate reason; aside from how he was with Dean, Castiel didn’t seem particularly social. “It’s really no trouble, Cas. It could just be us five if you like.”

Castiel shut his eyes and shook his head vehemently. “Just a present, please.”

Mary sighed, glancing at Dean. Dean looked confused, but he sent a pleading look Mary’s way that seemed as mature as an adult’s expression: he thought Castiel was a deprived soul and he wanted to make him happy.

“Just a present,” Mary repeated, speaking more to Dean than to Cas now. Dean sat back, accepting the decision with only minimum disappointment. “Now, I’m just getting out of the car to get gas; you two look after Sammy for me, okay?”

On Friday afternoon, Mary dropped Castiel back at the hotel like everything was normal. He got to spend time with his mother on Fridays, so not even Dean thought anything was amiss when he waved Castiel goodbye and the other boy disappeared behind the door to 605.

But then Mary refilled the water bottles, sent Dean and Sam to the toilet, gave them a snack to eat in the car, and she drove them back out.

“Where are we going?” Dean asked for the tenth time. “I don’t want to go to the doctor, don’t make me have a shot, pleaaaase.”

Mary laughed; perhaps the tease had gone on too long. “It’s nothing like that. Look where we are.” The car bumped up into a wide, half-empty parking lot, its grey tarmac dulled into purple by the cloudy twilight. Orange lights flooded the lot at certain points, and Mary navigated the painted rows, spoiled for choice.

“Target,” Dean said, leaning forward to hold onto the back of the front seat. “Why are we here?”

“Getting Cas a present for his birthday, of course,” Mary smiled. “The stroller’s in the trunk; Sam can take a nap while we walk around. You can pick anything you like – within reason.”

“Can I get him a bike?”

“Ahhh... that would be where ‘within reason’ comes in,” Mary said, parking as close to the store as she could, directly between an SUV and an electric car. “Keep it under thirty dollars, all right?”

“Three tens are thirty; okay. How much are bikes?”

“More than thirty dollars.”

“Oh.”

With Sam strapped into the stroller and Dean under strict instructions not to run off, they made their way inside the huge store. It never ceased to amaze Mary how big these stores were. Fluorescent lights, aisles that stretched to near-infinity.

Still, a big store was handy when Mary had no clue what Cas would want for his birthday. Dean probably knew better – they talked all the time, and shared games on Dean’s gameboy nearly every day. They also brought their library books home; Mary had heard them reading aloud to each other more than once, and she knew they shared broad interests.

Dean’s reading ability had improved exponentially since he’d known Cas, and Mary’s only explanation for it was that Cas had been teaching him. For someone who wasn’t yet seven, Castiel was probably as smart as a ten-year-old, or someone even older. Well, perhaps it was a certain type of smartness. Mary had seen him ordering M&Ms in colour order and counting them before he ate them, and she’d also seen evidence of a crazy contraption that let him get the cookie jar down off the top shelf of her kitchen cupboard without breaking the glass. Dean and Cas didn’t realise she knew what they got up to when she wasn’t around, but she knew. So did the hotel staff. Thick as thieves, were Dean and Cas. Sometimes literally.

The point was, Mary believed Castiel’s sneak-thief ability was something akin to domestic smarts, but compared to Dean, and all Dean’s knowledge of crossing the road only when it was safe, and not petting mad-eyed dogs, and making sure to go to the bathroom before leaving home, Castiel’s smarts fell short.

Really, she didn’t know what to make of the kid. She’d once worried he might be a bad influence on Dean, but despite the (mostly well-intentioned) petty crime, they’d hugely improved each other’s character over the past six months. Mary couldn’t imagine a version of Dean who didn’t have Cas plastered to his side, or a Cas-related anecdote waiting on his tongue. Cas made Dean smarter, stronger, and probably a tiny bit dangerous.

However, none of that mattered when Dean stood at the turning between the board games and the action toys, and didn’t know which way to turn. He hesitated twice; clearly he didn’t know what to get his friend any more than Mary did.

“How about a book,” Mary said. “We passed the book section already.”

“He reads books once and he doesn’t need to read them again,” Dean said, shaking his head. He poked at an ant farm kit that sat on the divider between two aisles, but he didn’t take any real interest.

“What about you?” Mary asked with a smile, quickly checking Sam was asleep. “Do you need to read books again?”

“Yeah,” Dean said with a sigh. “Reading’s not fun unless it’s with Cas. He does the voices like you do. And he doesn’t laugh at me when I do the voices wrong. I can’t do the voices at school because people laugh.”

Mary pushed the stroller down the action toy aisle after Dean, walking slowly so he had time to look at all the red, blue and black boxes, with their glossy plastic fronts and promises of endless adrenaline-filled games. “What about when you read to yourself?” Mary asked. “Is it fun then?”

“Sort of,” Dean said. He touched a box of super-duper high-powered Nerf guns, then moved on when he saw the price. “I like the ones about ponies. There’s a whole series.”

Mary didn’t recall seeing that in Dean’s school bag, therefore it must’ve been one from Castiel’s school library. “How come you don’t read them to me at bedtime?”

Dean shrugged, fingers tugging on the sleeves of his jacket. “I dunno.”

“How about we read one together tonight?”

Dean shrugged again, and tried to look back at Mary, but his eyes didn’t make it before he turned his head away completely. There was something in his posture that meant he was withholding something, something he wanted to say but couldn’t, for reasons unknown to Mary. She was going to coax it out of him, she made it her mission.

“What’re the pony books about?” she asked.

“Nothing,” Dean said, putting a plastic handgun back on the shelf before he could drop the heavy box. “Just, there’s some ponies and unicorns, and they’re magic and stuff.”

“Oh, unicorns are cool,” Mary said with a wide smile. “Like my tattoo.”

“Yeah,” Dean said.

Mary didn’t prompt him further; he was busy examining the box of a Spider-Man toy. His mouth moved as he read the words in his head, but then he pressed his lips together and put the toy back.

“I thought Cas liked Spider-Man,” Mary said. Dean carried on down the aisle, looking from right to left, high and low. Sam stirred inside the stroller, but didn’t wake.

Dean answered eventually, looking back at Mary before he reached the end of the aisle. “He doesn’t think Spider-Man is real,” he said, striding off around the corner. Mary pushed the stroller after him, angling its front wheel to follow Dean. Dean called back, “He likes Peter Parker but he says it’s... A word. Not real.”

“Fictional? Unrealistic?”

“Ye...ah...” Dean’s reply trailed off as he wandered into the next aisle and registered what he was looking at. Mary figured he’d meant to take the other turning, heading down the board games aisle, but instead they were in the aisle drowned in pink. Barbie dolls, big plastic heads for makeup and hair accessories, nail art, animal toys that moved and made noises, baby dolls that cried real tears; the list of things that came in shades of pink was probably limitless.

Mary was ready to reverse and turn around, but she didn’t yet, because Dean was frozen to the spot. His fingers were clasped together at his middle, face turned to the shelf closest to him. Mary observed his profile, and took note of his wide-open eyes, lips parted in obvious interest.

One of his hands slowly reached out to touch a pink box. A brown-skinned Barbie with a plastic smile peered out from inside, her impossibly slim figure dressed up in denim dungarees, high heels and a floral hat. Dean held the box very differently to how he held the Spider-Man toy or the gun; he concentrated.

Mary swallowed, making sure she didn’t stutter when she finally spoke. “Does Cas want a Barbie?”

Dean blinked, then blinked again more forcefully, as if returning from a daydream. He put the box back on the shelf and stuck his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “No,” he said, in a quiet voice. He looked away.

A logical follow-up question rose to Mary’s tongue easily – Do you want a Barbie? – but she stayed quiet rather than asking it. She mulled the question over as they went down the pink aisle, and she worried about Dean while they walked. She didn’t have a problem with him wanting a Barbie – hell, she’d enjoyed her fair share of violent action toys at his age, it wasn’t unheard of to reject what was expected of one’s gender – but she took issue with the way Dean kept his head down and bulltrod his way past everything. He was seven years old, he wasn’t allowed repress his desires like that.

The worst thing was wondering what made him think it wasn’t okay. Was it his teachers? Other children at school? Cas?

No, it couldn’t be Cas. Cas didn’t give a damn what other people wanted, so long as he got his freedom.

It took another half-hour, until Dean had picked out what he wanted to get, before Mary had worked up the nerve to be the parent she wanted to be. She stopped them in the plushie aisle, took the wooden dinosaur-building kit and the fluffy bumblebee plushie out of Dean’s hands and crouched down beside the stroller, looking her son in the eye. He was taller than her like this.

“Dean,” she said. “I’d like to set you a challenge.”

Dean was tired from walking, but he stopped fidgeting and looked at her, enticed by her lead-in. “Okay?”

“If you agree to read your favourite pony story with me this evening before bed, I’ll let you pick out one toy for yourself, now.”

Dean guessed what Mary was trying to poke at. “Does it have to be from this aisle?”

Mary smiled. “It can be from any aisle.” She took a breath and added, “You can pick anything you want, within reason. Twenty dollars at the most.”

Dean swallowed, his green eyes sweeping Mary’s face, eyelashes flickering. “C- Can I get a guitar?”

Mary blinked in surprise. “A guitar?”

Dean nodded eagerly. “It has flashing lights, it makes cool noises and it teaches you music. It’s educational!”

Mary ducked her head, hiding her grin. “Sure,” she chuckled, standing up. “If it’s under twenty bucks, it’s all yours.”

And that is the story of how Mary Winchester went back home with an infernal noise-making device, with eight different beat settings, backing vocals on demand, and six strings which lit up in neon colours and sang at the slightest touch. She could have damned the thing to hell and back a hundred times over, were it not for the fact that Dean looked really, really happy when he played with it.

The pony book turned out to be one of those stories which were inexplicably geared towards little girls. Mary never got why; a horse was a horse, there was nothing terribly gendered about a horse with a death spike on its head, even if it did shoot rainbows. What Mary wanted to know was why there weren’t any books about unicorns which boys felt it was okay to want to read.

They read for ten minutes, and Dean truly impressed Mary with his enunciation skills – not to mention the fact his reading ability had stepped up noticeably since the last time they’d read together, only last week.

At the end of those ten minutes, Dean sat with his arms around his knees and his face buried in the blanket, and he confessed to Mary that the other boys at school said he wasn’t allowed to read books with pink on the cover. Cas had been borrowing the series from his school library so Dean didn’t have to suffer the humiliation.

“That was very nice of him,” Mary said gently, holding the slim volume, glittery cover face-up. “But next time those boys tell you you’re not supposed to like pink, ask them why it’s okay for girls to like blue. Get them to think about why they believe you can’t like whatever the hell you want. You’ve learned about the light spectrum in science, haven’t you?”

Dean looked up, chin propped on his knees. “Yeah, Miss Grosby gave us prisms to look through. The carpet was full of rainbows.”

Mary smiled. “You know what’s cool about pink?”

“What?”

“Pink isn’t visible through one of those prisms. It uses more than one wavelength of colour. So, when you make a rainbow, pink isn’t there.”

“So it’s a magic colour?”

“Could be!” Mary rested her hand on Dean’s neck, leaning in to kiss his forehead. “Pink is the best colour around. You remember that, okay? Now, come on, get to sleep. You’ve had a long day.”

Dean lay down when Mary nudged him, and she leaned forward so he could return her goodnight kiss on her cheek. She sat angled over him for a few seconds longer, peering down at his long eyelashes and pretty lips, wondering how many of Dean’s current preferences would carry through in later years. Perhaps his love of unicorns and pink was a phase. Perhaps it wasn’t.

When Dean gave her an inquiring look, Mary smiled softly. “It’s nothing,” she assured him. “I just want you to know, I love you no matter what.”

Dean frowned. “I know.”

Mary’s smile grew. Of course; Dean hadn’t even considered that his peers’ prejudice might mirror her own. She blinked slowly, shaking her head. “Night-night, Dean.”

“Night-night.”

“You picked Cas some good things today. We’ll wrap them tomorrow, give them to him Monday.” She pulled back and stood up, tucking Dean in comfortably. “Sleep well, honey.”

“You too, Mom.”

Castiel wouldn’t let them wait until his mother got home before he opened his presents. He stood between Mary and the telephone, wide-eyed in desperation.

“Cas,” Mary said, completely confused, “Why won’t you let me call your mom? She might find a way to come home early, we could have a birthday dinner!”

“I don’t want that!” Castiel insisted, side-stepping into Mary’s path again. “I don’t want her here! I want to enjoy this without her! She’ll ruin everything!”

That stopped Mary in her tracks. Her feet ceased trying to dodge around the boy, and she gave up reaching for the phone. “Why do you think she’ll ruin it?”

Castiel’s mouth turned down at the corners; he seemed ready to cry. His blue eyes were stormy but he came across as helpless and small, regardless of his intended force.

Mary reached out for him with both hands, and Castiel exhaled and ran into her arms, hugging her tight. Mary held him for as long as he needed to be held.

She sighed slowly, closing her eyes. She sensed Dean was lurking behind her, but she knew the two of them had no secrets from each other – anything Mary needed to ask Cas was a question that could be asked in front of Dean.

“Does she hurt you?” Mary asked quietly.

Castiel shook his head, dark hair crumpling against Mary’s sweater. He sniffed.

Mary pressed her lips together, hands stroking Cas’ head to lift him away. His face was streaked with tears. “It’s your birthday,” Mary said. “We’re going to celebrate however you want.”

“Nothing, I don’t want anything,” Castiel said. “I just want to open my presents, that’s all.”

“You’re sure? I can make cake?”

Castiel shook his head and stepped away, going to Dean’s side with his arms folded. Dean stared at him with immense concern, and put an arm over his friend’s shoulders when he got close enough.

Weird kid, Mary thought. There was still something Castiel wasn’t saying, but now probably wasn’t the best time to pry.

They sat cross-legged around the coffee table (Sam too), being careful with their cups of juice when they put the presents in the middle. Dean had wrapped the dinosaur kit in newspaper and drawn brontosauri all over it, which Mary had warned him would give away half the surprise. Castiel didn’t mind at all – in fact, he took pleasure from having been given a clue.

When he peeled back the paper wrapping, Castiel’s face made a picture worth well over a thousand words. He was full of hope, and excitement, and – when the paper fell away – sheer joy. He was delighted that he’d guessed right. Mary envisioned how the rest of the evening would go: Dean and Cas would construct the little creature later, and Sam would only eat one tailbone before Mary caught him in the act and put him in his crib.

The dinosaur-building kit would go down a treat, basically. The bumblebee plushie, however, brought Castiel to tears.

Mary had never seen a child cry from happiness before, but there it was.

The blue wrapping Mary had used lay discarded over the coffee table, and Castiel knelt folded over it, hugging the bee so tight its smiley face and antennae bulged out from under his shoulder. The toy had sky-blue wings, soft on the inside with a shimmery material on the outside, and its body was one big, fat lump, its yellow-and-black stripes shaggy and soft as anything.

Dean rested his cheek on Castiel’s back and giggled, misty-eyed in reaction to Castiel’s weeping. Cas shook and shivered and sobbed occasionally, the sounds intermixed with laughter. Mary clasped her fingers over her lips, feeling them tremble at the sight of Castiel’s reaction. The gift clearly meant everything to him. Dean had picked exactly the right thing.

“What’s a job interview mean?” Castiel asked, hugging his bee plushie. The hotel manager went to sit at the end of Dean’s bed, and Castiel twitched uncomfortably. Dean didn’t mind his bed being sat on, however, so Castiel forgot about it.

The hotel manager tucked her poofy black hair behind her ears with both hands. “It means Dean’s mom’s gone out hunting for a new place to work. Until now she was only working while you guys were at school. But she said to me, she’s gotta find somewhere with better pay for the same hours. Or she can’t pay for all the dessert you’ve been eating!”

Castiel looked worriedly at Dean. “No dessert?”

Dean shook his head. “Even when we didn’t have a house, we had dessert, Cas. Don’t worry.”

The hotel manager smiled, clapping her hands together and putting them between her knees. She was a babysitter today. It wasn’t supposed to happen a lot but this was the third time Castiel remembered seeing her in this room. Her face was becoming more familiar to him; her cheeks were round, and her skin was a cheerful shade of brown. Her body was square because she wore a smart red jacket all the time, which had the hotel logo on its pocket. A badge beside the logo said ‘Yael | Manager’. She kept watching Dean and Cas, and Dean and Cas watched her back.

Sam made a chattering noise over by the TV, bouncing up and down happily as Big Bird waddled onto the screen.

Castiel tugged on Dean’s sleeve and turned his face away from the manager to whisper, “Dean, let’s leave now.” He wanted to explore the basement today. He’d already taken the key from the front desk, and he couldn’t wait to use it.

“Can’t,” Dean whispered back. “We’re not allowed to go anywhere while we’re being babysat on, remember?”

Castiel squeezed his bee plushie tighter, feeling trapped, and nervous because of it.

Dean observed his tension, and formulated a plan. “We’re going to the bathroom,” he announced to the hotel manager. He took hold of Castiel’s ripped sleeve and pulled him along past the kitchen.

“Uh— Aren’t you old enough to go by yourselves?” the manager called, but Dean ignored her.

Dean pushed Castiel into the bathroom and locked the door behind them while Castiel turned on the light. Castiel saw they were alone and let out a sigh of relief. He put his bumblebee down on the green bathroom chair and sat cross-legged on the floor, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath. Slow breathing was something the school counsellor had taught him. It was supposed to stop him being naughty, but instead it helped him be naughty in cleverer ways.

“What shall we do?” Dean asked, kneeling in front of Castiel.

Castiel shrugged. The bathroom was comfortably cool, and the white and grey walls were quite calming. Castiel didn’t really have any ideas, but the blankness didn’t bother him. It was nice to empty his mind for a while.

“Can I pick?” Dean asked. Castiel nodded.

Dean grinned. “Awesome.” He got his his feet and started looking through the bathroom cabinets, opening and closing drawers. There were only four drawers and one cupboard, and when Dean got to the cupboard, there was a knock on the door.

“What are you two doing in there?” the hotel manager called through the door. “You’d better not be making trouble! I know what you get up to when you think we can’t see you!”

Dean looked back at the door, pausing with a bottle in his hand. It was Castiel’s turn to reassure him, and he spoke softly so the manager couldn’t hear: “She can’t see us in here, Dean.”

Dean swallowed, slowly relaxing.

The manager knocked again. “Are you both all right?”

“Yes,” Castiel called. “Please go away, I can’t poop if you’re listening.”

There was a shocked pause, but then the manager shuffled away. Dean grinned at Castiel, and Castiel held onto his toes and grinned back.

Dean resumed his exploration of the cupboard, and pulled out anything he found of interest. “We could make an explosion,” he said, pointing at the three aerosol canisters.

“No fire inside,” Castiel warned him. “And I don’t have a lighter today, Mamma took it to work because she wants cigarettes again.”

“Maybe we could make a potion,” Dean said, pulling out liquid soap and a bottle of perfume. “Like in George’s Marvellous Medicine! We can make your mom better and then she wouldn’t need all her pills.”

“Last time I tried that she threw up,” Castiel said sadly. “And then she needed two times as many pills, because the other ones went in the toilet.”

Dean put the soap and perfume back regretfully, then the aerosols too. He stared for a while, sitting back on his heels.

Then his hand shot forward and he made a bright sound which let Castiel know he’d hit the jackpot.

“This,” Dean said, showing Castiel a cloth bag. It was vertically-striped in pink and white, with the shape of a black leather skull stitched into one corner. Dean undid the zip at the top, and whatever was inside tocked and clinked. He made the mouth of the zipper open wide like at the dentist, and he showed Castiel the contents.

“Colours,” Castiel said.

“Makeup!” Dean said. “Mom puts it on and she looks even prettier than normal.”

Castiel frowned. “How? They’re too small to wear...”

“They’re not clothes, they’re like paint. Face paint.”

“Oh,” Castiel said, more interested now. He shuffled closer, kneeling so his knees were pressed to Dean’s thigh. “Can we look like monsters?”

“No, Cas!” Dean looked offended, which was strange. His expression softened, and he explained further: “I wanna look like Mom. You can put it on me, here.” He shoved the bag in Castiel’s direction. “The black stick with wet fluff goes on my eyelashes, and the soft spade puts dust on my eyelids, and the lipstick goes on my mouth.”

“I don’t know what those look like,” Castiel said.

Dean sighed and stood up. “I’ll show you.”

Mary trudged along the hallway, pausing halfway down to lean against the wall and pull off her heeled shoes. The cold carpet was relief for her stocking-clad feet, and she walked slowly towards her room.

She knocked on the door, head down.

Yael opened the door with Sam sitting on her hip, and Mary managed a soft, “Hi,” and a tickle to Sam’s chin before she slunk into the room and Yael closed the door for her.

“You’re back early,” Yael said, stating the obvious.

“Yeah,” Mary sighed, putting down her shoes, then taking Sam from Yael and bouncing him. She then set him down on the floor, because damn, he was heavy. “Interviewer already chose, I got there and there were two other people being shooed out. Why did they bother calling me this morning? Fuck knows.”

“Girl, that’s gotta sting like hell,” Yael said, sticking her hands on her hips and puckering her lips.

“Oh, it does,” Mary agreed, reaching behind her head to undo her hairclip. Her locks fell about her shoulders and she shook her hair out, running her fingers back through it. “Where are Dean and Cas?”

“Bathroom,” Yael said, folding her arms. “Do they usually go to the bathroom together?”

Mary chuckled. “They hate to have anything take away from their precious time. I find books in there, I’m pretty sure they read to each other while one of them’s sitting on the can.”

Yael looked mildly disgusted, but lifted her eyebrows in assurance that yeah, that was just what kids did. Freakish, mad creatures, the lot of them.

“Anyway,” Mary said, with a frustrated smile. “Thanks for looking after them, it means a lot.”

“Barely took fifteen minutes,” Yael said dismissively. “Honestly, Mary, you need anything – anything at all – I’m your first port of call, you hear me? Quit acting so apologetic every time you need something. Supporting you is what I’m here for.”

Mary gave a grateful smile, nodding. “I’ll bear that in mind.”

Yael headed for the door, grinning over her shoulder. “Your kids are as well-behaved as they come, in this place. Swear to God, that’s saying something.”

“I take it that’s not including Castiel,” Mary reasoned, waiting at the door with her head resting on the frame.

Yael gave a small forced laugh, stepping out onto the hallway carpet. “Nah,” she said. “Castiel is one of the worst we’ve ever had. We get a hundred ladies through this end of the building in a year, all of them are damaged. Stories not so different to yours. Husbands, brothers, fathers. Even the occasion lesbian partner,” Yael whispered the last two words, cupping her hand around half her mouth. She let her hand fall, and her smile turned pitying. “But no matter what their problems are – you got the addicts, the escorts, the ones that seem almost normal – the kids are always messed up. If I didn’t see Castiel running around with Dean all the time...” Yael trailed off, turning her eyes away. “I’m sure he’s a good kid, under it all. He’s not violent, which is why I’ve let him and his mom stay.”

“He is a good kid,” Mary said, fully believing it. “I think Dean helps him.”

“Oh, I don’t doubt it,” Yael laughed, waggling a finger as she turned away and started walking. “I don’t doubt it at all. You have a pair of no-good meddlers in your midst, Mary! Masterminds!”

Mary chuckled, watching her friend reach the end of the hall and turn off towards the elevator. She appreciated that Yael thought Dean was smart. Often, when adults caught Dean and Cas in the act, they assumed it was all Castiel’s doing. But Dean was a sneaky little wretch too, when he wanted to be.

Shaking her head, Mary backed into the room and closed the door, checking that Sam was occupied. He was singing along to the TV, flubbing most of the lyrics but keeping time nevertheless.

Mary groaned and stretched out her arms, took off her jacket, and threw it on the bed.

Feeling a shout of anger boiling up inside her, Mary instead took a moment to breathe, both hands over her face. Frustrated mutterings and pangs of annoyance swelled within her mind, but she fought to keep it all at bay. So long as nothing else went wrong today, she could just enjoy a quiet evening, drink something nice, go to bed early, and maybe the idea of knuckling down tomorrow to do it all again wouldn’t seem so unbearable.

She took one more deep breath, then made her way to the bathroom.

She listened at the door before knocking, just to make sure the interruption wouldn’t disturb a highly sensitive environment.

“You got the wrong one,” Dean said. “I said the blue one!”

“This is blue,” Castiel replied. “The babysitter was leaving and your mom was there. I had five seconds!”

“Mom’s back?”

“She’s talking, it’s okay,” Castiel said. “Turn around, I can’t see the zipper.”

Mary frowned, raising her fist, ready to knock. She heard the sound of a delicate zipper, not the hard-wearing ones usually found on Dean’s clothes.

“Do I look all right?” Dean asked, and his voice was accompanied by the swish of material.

“I don’t know,” Castiel said. “I can’t see your freckles any more, it’s weird.”

Mary was definitely too curious to wait. She knocked three times. The rattle of panic on the other side of the door was something she expected. “It’s me,” she called. “What are you two doing in there?”

“Nothing!”

She tutted. “It’s never nothing. I’m coming in.”

“Wait!” Dean shouted. “I’m not— I’m not dressed!”

Mary frowned, sticking her thumbnail in the back of the door handle and unlocking the door with practised ease. “I know what you look like, Dean,” she said, pushing open the door.

She had been prepared for something puke-worthy, or water damage so bad she’d have to summon Yael back to beg for forgiveness and a plumber, or perhaps something that would make her laugh and call Anna in hysterics, but she wasn’t expecting the reality of what she saw.

The bathroom was a mess. Makeup littered the whole area around the sink – every brush, wand, and sponge was stained with both wet and dry products in all the shades of the rainbow, and then some. Every eyeshadow palette appeared to have been shovelled by fingertips and smeared on any nearby surface. The towels were stained, the floor was smudged, the faucet was gunky, the mirror was dirty. Dean and Castiel’s names were quite literally painted in the middle of this disaster, and each letter stood out, bold and horrendous.

Stunned, Mary looked from the room to its small, wide-eyed occupants, and she realised the state of the bathroom was not even the worst of it.

Castiel’s entire person was smudged with makeup, mascara on his nose and a lipstick kiss on his cheek, and in his hands he held an eyeshadow case with the colours muddled. But that wasn’t what made Mary’s mouth drop open. Dean stood beside Cas, wearing one of Mary’s cocktail dresses: it was lilac in colour, and so long it dragged on the ground. His face was painted with thick foundation; lines of mascara seemed to explode from his eyes, eyeshadow of six different colours covered three square inches around his eyebrows, and his lips were bright red.

“What... the hell are you doing?” Mary said, even though it was obvious. “You’ve made so much mess—”

Dean’s eyes started to water. “We were just playing,” he said, mucky fingers clutching at the dress. “W-we were just—”

“Cas, get out,” Mary snapped. “Go home, I’ve had enough of this.”

Castiel dropped the eyeshadow on the floor and ran off, head down. Dean cried out, reaching for him, but Cas was already gone. Mary saw a black tear roll from Dean’s eye, bumping past his coloured cheek, drying out before it reached his chin.

Mary rubbed at her temples, chewing at her tongue to keep herself from shouting. “Do you even know what a hassle this is, Dean?” she said calmly. “Now I need to get replacement for what you’ve ruined. Believe it or, makeup is expensive, like everything else in life. Plus, I need to get dry-cleaning done on the dress. It’s satin, Dean! Did you think that would be easy to clean? And do you think I have time to clean you up this evening? No, I don’t! I need to look for another job, I’ve lost another job because I can’t be flexible with my hours. God forbid I—”

God forbid she become like Castiel’s mother, absent and uncaring, letting her child stand there with tears running down his face because he was terrified and ashamed and alone—

“Oh, fuck me,” Mary breathed, going forward to kneel at Dean’s feet, taking both his hands. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Dean, that was an overreaction. Stop crying. Stop crying, come on, you’re making the dress dirtier.”

Dean’s fingers were curled up against his eyes, sobbing horribly-coloured gloop all the way down his wrists. Mary grabbed a scrunch of toilet paper and started wiping him, and sighed when he lifted his hands away and showed her that his face was grimy and smeared with tears.

“It’s okay,” she said softly, trying to reassure him as much as herself. “It’s just makeup. Just a dress.” She looked up at the sink, and saw the bathroom mirror had lipstick kiss marks on it. They’d had fun, and she was ruining it. She closed her eyes, bringing Dean’s warm body in for a hug. She cradled the back of his head, not caring that her white shirt was getting muck all over it; if she was headed for the dry-cleaners then an extra shirt wasn’t a big deal. None of this was a big deal, really. A teeny-tiny setback for her, perhaps – but an important development for Dean.

“It was Cas’ idea,” Dean said, leaning back as snot dribbled out his nose and into his mouth. “He wanted to make me look like a girl.”

Mary stared at Dean. She knew him well enough to know a lie from his mouth, and in hearing the lie, she figured out the truth: it had been Dean’s idea, and Dean wanted to look like a girl.

Dean wasn’t one to keep personal things from Mary, their lifestyle forced them to be open about nearly everything. Mary understood why Dean lied. Shame. Shame and unwillingness to reveal something he was only experimenting with. She didn’t think it was fair to make him admit his lie; she’d let him get away with this one.

“Well,” she said, “you can tell Cas he did a good job. I think you look really pretty, honey.”

“No I didn’t,” Dean sobbed, sniffling as Mary wiped away the clumps of makeup that had collected under his reddened eyes. “I look like a clown. Cas got the dress instead of me, ‘cause if Sam saw me he’d scream.”

Mary burst out laughing, because it was probably true.

“I can’t do it properly,” Dean said. “I can’t remember where all the colours are meant to go on my face.”

“You were mostly right,” Mary said, making Dean blow his nose into the tissue. “I think the idea is ‘less is more’, though.”

“What’s that mean?”

Mary chuckled. “Um. Just put a little bit on next time. Don’t unload the whole tub over your face, maybe.”

Dean nodded slowly, absorbing the suggestion. “It— It didn’t look right so I put more on.”

“And Cas helped?”

Dean paused, then nodded. “I kissed him. Just on his cheek.”

Mary bit her lip, trying to suppress her smile. “Why’d you kiss him, huh?”

Dean shrugged. “So it was like when you drop us at school, you leave lipstick on my face.” His breath caught and fluttered in his throat, and he turned his eyes down before adding, “He’s really cute sometimes.”

Mary ran her hand over her lips, but couldn’t restrain her grin. “He is cute, isn’t he.” She snorted, then hugged Dean again. “Ahh, you’re adorable little terrors, the both of you. Hell knows why I put up with you.”

“‘Cause you love us.”

“Yeah, I do,” Mary nodded. “Come on, you need a bath. Let’s get this dress off.”

Dean turned around so she could undo the zipper. It took a couple of minutes of careful operation, but at last the dress was off with no additional stains.

“Would you go and find Cas for me?” Mary asked Dean gently, stroking back his eyeshadow-streaked hair. She reached for a makeup wipe, cleaning up the worst of the muck from Dean’s cheeks. More softly, Mary added, “I think I owe him an apology too.”

Dean nodded. Mary wasn’t sure if he meant yes, he’d go and find Cas, or yes, she ought to say sorry. But she didn’t ask. She cleaned him up the best she could, and off he went to find Cas.

He came back a minute later, bearing the news that Castiel wasn’t at home in room 605. So, with Sam and Dean holding her hands, Mary set off to hunt down Castiel. She was sure he hadn’t gone far.

Once they got to the end of the first hallway, Dean led the expedition. With him in charge, finding Cas would be “as easy as pie and cake mixed together,” Dean said. “With chocolate sauce. And custard. And eatable glitter.”

Indeed, it only took minutes. They eventually found Castiel in the basement, hiding between crates of dirty bedsheets. Mary knelt down and gave him a big hug, whispering the same heartfelt apologies she’d given Dean. She leaned back, touching the lipsticked kiss mark Dean had left on Castiel’s cheek. “Are we good?” she asked, offering a smile.

Castiel nodded with such astonished gratitude that it made Mary wonder if he’d ever been apologised to before. Trying to put that thought out of her mind, Mary led her grubby little troupe back to room 604 for dinner.

Mary handed over Castiel’s bee plushie, then they made dinner together, and ate as a family.

It was during that meal, all sitting around the coffee table still covered in makeup, Mary realised both she and Dean counted Cas as one of their own. She loved them both equally, and Dean had known it without being told.

On the 18th of September, approximately one year after Dean and Cas had first met, Castiel was not waiting at the bus stop to be collected after school. Dean clung to his mom’s sleeve as she burst into the school office. At first she was merely curious if Cas had been called in for a late counselling session and Auntie Jo had forgotten to tell her. But when she was told he wasn’t, Dean watched her become worried. He held her hand, because he was worried too.

While Mom was behind the office lady’s desk to use her phone, Dean sat with Sammy on a leather couch, singing him nursery rhymes so he had something to do other than worry. Castiel knew a lot of things to do when nobody was there to tell him no, but he also wasn’t very good at keeping safe. Dean didn’t want him to be in danger.

Two of the teachers and the janitor were called up to search the school, and Dean sat with the office lady and Sammy while Mom went hunting with the teachers. The office lady gave them each a candy bar, but Dean’s candy didn’t taste right because he was nervous.

Mom came back after an hour, and her hair was out of place and she looked more worried than she ever had before. “We’ll have to look around town,” Dean heard her saying to one of the teachers, a fat, bald man with a face like a hammer had squashed all his features downwards. “I need a map of all the places in walking distance of here.”

Dean jumped off his wheeled office chair and went to Mom’s side, pulling at her top. “Mom,” he said.

“Not now,” Mom said, petting Dean away. She looked back at the teachers, thanking the squash-faced man when he pulled a map from a filing cabinet.

“Mom,” Dean said again.

“Honey, not now,” Mom hushed. “Cas is missing, we need to find him before something bad happens.”

“He wanted to go home,” Dean said, tugging on Mom’s clothes again. “He doesn’t like waiting for us, he would go home.”

Mom tried to dismiss him a third time, but paused, looking at Dean strangely. Then she turned to the office lady. “Please, I need to borrow your phone again.”

“Dial zero to call out,” the office lady reminded her, even though she’d already said it when Mom called Auntie Jo.

Everyone in the warm office went completely silent, listening to the ringing noise in the phone as Mom held it to her ear.

Mom shut her eyes, frowning. Waiting.

Someone picked up. “Winchester residence, Castiel speaking,” came the voice.

Mom sagged over a desk in relief, and Dean gave a happy jump. “Thank God. Oh, thank God, Cas! You’re at home.”

Castiel replied again, but Dean didn’t hear because Sam asked aloud if they were going home now. Mom didn’t talk for long, but she nodded a lot, and put a hand on her hip, and gave a frazzled smile to the teachers. They left the office before the phone call was over, and when she hung up the phone, Mom gave the office lady a hug.

“You’d better get yourself back there,” the office lady said, giving Mom’s hand a friendly pat. “Call the school when you get a chance, I’d like to know he’s safe.”

“I will. Thank you. Thank you!” Mom gathered up Sam’s daycare bag and the candy wrappers, then took Dean’s hand and led him out of the office.

It had gotten dark outside, and the bus stop looked strange with car headlights brushing orange over the indigo road. The Impala was parked a short way along, gleaming with the same lights.

They drove home, and it was quiet. Warm, brooding and thoughtful. Dean almost fell asleep, but Mom nudged him into full consciousness when they pulled into the hotel’s parking garage.

The long white lights hanging from the concrete ceiling made Dean’s eyes sting as he walked along. He was awake enough to hold the door open for his mom and Sammy, and they entered the heated comfort of the lobby.

Mom carried Sammy in the elevator, and Dean resisted sitting down on the floor to rest his legs; they’d be home soon.

Dean opened the door to 604 with Mom’s keycard, and when they went inside, the lights were already on.

Mom coughed. “What’s that smell— Oh God. Dean, take Sammy.”

Mom ran off into the kitchen, shrieking, “Cas! God, what are you doing? Stop.” Dean entered the kitchen holding Sam’s hand, and they observed Mom crouching in front of the oven, waving an oven glove to clear the thin grey smoke. She stood up to turn on the range hood fan, and coughed twice before braving an extraction of the burning thing from the oven.

Castiel stood by, hands fiddling with a spatula. He was wearing a coloured party hat, with an elastic strap tucked under his chin to keep the cone on his head.

Mom sighed, clattering the burned tray onto the stovetop. The smoke cleared, and the smoke alarm only beeped once before it decided there wasn’t a problem. It wasn’t as bad as when Mom made toast sometimes.

“Dare I ask what this is?” Mom said apprehensively. She was still staring at the tray.

“It’s a pizza,” Castiel said. “Birthday pizza.”

Sam plonked himself down on the floor. “Who’s got a burfday?”

Castiel looked down at Sam. “Me. I came home early to make my pizza.”

Mom scratched at her messy hair, turning around to lean on the kitchen workbench. She looked at Castiel like she was absolutely done with him, except she clearly wasn’t. “Your birthday was in February,” she said.

“No it wasn’t?” Castiel frowned.

Dean poked him in the shoulder. “Yes, it was. We got you your bee plushie.”

Castiel blinked, and then his eyes started to widen. They got so wide Dean could see the whole circle of blue in them, and his mouth opened up too. “Oh,” he said, almost in a whisper. Then his mouth and eyes shut at once, and he looked down, fingers turning white where he gripped his spatula.

Mom crouched in front of Cas, taking the spatula from him, setting it on the burned tray. Then she took Castiel’s hands and looked into his eyes, even though he didn’t look back.

“Cas,” Mom said. “You did something very bad today. You came home by yourself, without telling anyone. Do you know why that was bad?”

Dean took a breath because he knew the answer, but Mom shook her head at him. Dean let his breath go and allowed Castiel to reply.

“It wasn’t... safe,” Castiel said. “I could be kidnapped.”

Mom sighed. “That’s one reason, yes. You might get hit by a car, or lost, or any number of things. I don’t think you realised how worried you made us.”

“Yeah!” Dean interjected. “They had, like, five teachers and the police looking for you!”

“Dean, don’t exaggerate,” Mom scolded him, without heat. She pressed her lips together and squeezed on Castiel’s hands. “Dean’s not wrong though, there was a big fuss. Don’t think nobody notices you, Cas. One of your teachers told me you drew him a picture. He loved it so much he stuck it on the back of his desk so everyone could see.”

Castiel squirmed out of Mom’s hands and stepped back, so his shoulders were pressed against the cutlery drawer. He swallowed and stared at the floor. “Nobody else liked it. They ruined it with pens every time they went up to Mr. Habanero's desk.”

Dean nudged Castiel in the side. “What was it a picture of?”

“Food,” Castiel answered. “Mr. Habanero thought it was for Harvest Festival.”

Mom frowned. “If it wasn’t for Harvest, what was it for?”

Castiel gulped. “All the things Mamma didn’t eat that week.”

There was a slow silence, broken only by the bump and clatter of Sammy arranging the fridge magnets into alphabetical order. Mom eventually exhaled, resting her hands on her knees.

“She may not eat any more than a mouse does, but that doesn’t mean you should be deprived too. You want pizza, pizza it is. I’m too tired to cook, let’s order in.”

“No, the shop doesn’t make birthday pizza,” Castiel said hastily, stepping after Mom before she could reach the phone. He halted when she turned to look at him, and he suddenly seemed very guilty, feet together, hands wringing, head bowed.

Mom shot Dean a quick look, but Dean didn’t know what it was for. A moment later, she asked Castiel, “Did you lie in February? Did you say it was your birthday when it wasn’t?”

Castiel fidgeted, and turned his head so low his party hat began to slip.

Mom reached to take the hat, but rather than removing it, she put it further up Castiel’s head. “It’s okay if you lied before, Cas. All you need to do is admit it now, be honest, and tell me why.”

Castiel’s breath stuttered, and Dean knew that meant he was nervous. So Dean moved to hold his hand, and that made Castiel relax a bit.

When he did eventually speak, he mumbled his reply. “Wanted a present.”

Mom took the black tray and put it in the sink, running water over it. “You said it was your birthday because—”

“I don’t get good presents,” Castiel said, voice breaking under the strain of emotion. He let go of Dean’s hand and sank to the floor, chin on his knees, arms around his legs. “Everyone at school gets candy and they say what they got for presents, and they get toys and pets and parties and vacations and new clothes. And when I want things Mamma says no, so I look like a hobo, and nobody wants to talk to me. I don’t live in a house. I barely even have parents. Mamma works and when she’s not working she’s horrible, and Dad never writes. I am a hobo, really.”

Mom’s back was turned, and Dean looked up when he heard her sob. Her hand was over her eyes, he couldn’t see but he knew. She took a few quick breaths, then lowered her hand.

Dean poked Castiel’s hat. “Who gave you the hat?”

Castiel was about to speak, but then he looked cautiously up at Dean’s mom, and second-guessed whatever he’d been about to say. He lowered his chin to his knees again when he replied, “Everyone at school gets one when it’s their birthday. But Mr. Habanero said I couldn’t have one because I put sand in Eddie’s bag. So I stole it from the supply closet when the bell went.”

Mom turned around, both hands over her face. “Cas,” she said, in a complaining, upset voice. “Honey, this needs to stop.” She peeked out from between her hands and sighed. “Why did you put sand in Eddie’s bag?”

“Because he told on me when I put sand in Mel’s bag,” Castiel said, like it was obvious. “And I put sand in Mel’s bag because she cut Saroya’s plait off when she wasn’t looking. I didn’t tell Mr. Habanero that it was Mel who did that, because then I’d have to tell him Saroya dropped paint on Mel’s skirt on purpose and not because of her ep-il-ep-sy, and Saroya told me to swear not to tell or she would tell the principal I like burning things.”

Dean had kept up easily – his own experiences at school weren’t too different – but Mom was gaping, hand gripping the kitchen workbench. “I— You—” She licked her lips. “You like burning things.”

“Not pizza though,” Castiel said. “I didn’t realise it was burning.”

Mom let out a shaken breath, and she shook her head and wiped her hand down her face. “Cas, you realise I need to tell your counsellor now. I suspected you were doing that but I didn’t—” Mom looked away.

Dean had only ever seen her look so at a loss once before, and that was the day they left Daddy. She looked like she might cry, or fall over. She didn’t look approachable, however, so Dean didn’t get up to hug her. Cas needed him right now anyway; he was shaking.

Mom let out a calming breath. Dean’s tension released when she smiled ever so slightly.

“Perhaps I should ask,” Mom said, crouching down opposite Cas. “What do you like to burn?”

Castiel shrugged. “Paper mostly. There’s so much in our room, Mamma never notices it’s gone. She likes to hoard it, but when she takes her pills she’s not as smart.” He swallowed, and his blue eyes locked to Mom’s, expressing his rapid thought as much as his need for her compassion. “Th- There’s something else...”

“Go on,” Mom nodded.

“I found Mamma’s legal papers.”

Mom nearly flinched. “Please tell me you didn’t burn those.”

“No, I— I read them.”

Mom hesitated. Her tongue slid over her bottom lip thoughtfully, and her eyes skipped to Dean’s before returning to Castiel’s. Then she looked back at Dean. “Dean, could you leave the room for a little bit? Take Sammy with you, check if he needs to go potty, okay?”

Dean frowned, looking at Castiel. Castiel looked back, equally unsure why he was being asked to leave.

“Why?” Dean asked.

“Because,” Mom said, “I’m going to ask about whatever it is Cas found on Auntie Jo’s legal papers, and that’s very private information which he shouldn’t be telling me.”

“So why ask?”

“Because Castiel is upset about it. It’s important that I know so I can help him.”

“I can help him too,” Dean said, sliding his hand into Castiel’s. Castiel’s palm was sweaty, and his fingers clamped down between Dean’s – but then he let go.

“I want to talk to your mom,” Castiel said, gazing at Dean apologetically. “She’s good at fixing my problems.”

Mom laughed sharply. “Honey, if I were as good as all that, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Go on, Dean. I’ll call you out in a minute.”

Dean reluctantly took Sam under his arms and frog-marched him to the bathroom. He looked back before he closed the door, and saw Mom reaching for Castiel’s hand, and Cas reaching to take it.

They went to the couch, Mary carrying Cas a glass of chocolate milk and herself a glass of orange juice. She set both glasses on newspaper coasters on the coffee table, and made herself comfortable beside Cas.

She unlaced her boots as Castiel picked up his bee plushie and gave it a hug.

“It’s okay if you don’t tell me,” Mary said. “Technically I have no right to know. I’m not your teacher, or your therapist. I’m not your mom—”

“Yes you are,” Castiel spoke into his plushie, and it was so mumbly that for a second, Mary thought she’d misheard. But Castiel looked up with his deep blue eyes, and a well of tears broke from the corner of one eye. He freed his mouth from his bee and breathed, “I wish you were my mom. I wish for that so much. I wish my mom wasn’t like she is, she’s like a robot zombie. You’re better.”

Mary covered her mouth with her hand, holding back a cry of horror, pain, whatever she was meant to exclaim when someone else’s kid said something like that. But she didn’t feel any of that. She felt sadness, yes, perhaps a touch of pity, but mostly, it was the need to reassure Cas. It took her a few seconds before she realised that wasn’t a bad thing.

“I’m as much your guardian as you need me to be, Cas,” she said, reaching to hold his hand. He turned his fingers and gripped her tight, eyes on the coffee table. “Anything you want to tell me, I’m listening.”

“Th-there is something,” Castiel started, licking his lips. “Mm... Mamma did something really bad.”

Thoughts sprinted through Mary’s mind, I’m sure it’s not as bad as that, followed by I always thought there was something off about her, and bringing up the rear was the darkest thought she’d had in years. I bet child protection services would let me take him if I got a good lawyer.

Mary frowned and cleared her throat. “What... Um, what kind of something?”

Castiel’s free hand rose to his mouth, and he picked at his lower lip, eyes staring into the mid-distance. “I found... something important. In our papers.”

Mary dreaded what was to come: Castiel looked weary, the kind of weariness she’d only seen in far older people.

Castiel’s lips trembled as he managed to speak, voice pressured by a tightened throat, “She paid for some time to live in a house. We’re moving away and she never told me.”

Mary’s heart iced over and came to a stop. She stared, breath shallow.

“I think—” Castiel’s tears dripped from his cheeks, one-two, “I think I’d rather be a hobo forever. If we move away... I can’t see you. I won’t see Dean, I can’t keep my bee here any more and I can’t take it with me because Mamma will see.”

Mary reached for the boy and wrapped him in a tight shoulder hug, eyes shut. “You never told her about your plushie?”

“No. She’d ask where I got it. She likes being the only one to give me things, but she doesn’t give me things.”

Mary pressed her lips together and stared at the ceiling. It hurt that Castiel’s motivations for lying made so much sense. He was only eight, as of today. He couldn’t cope with having this much to bear.

She felt Castiel’s tears slipping warm down her chest, under her shirt. She rested her cheek on his hair, mouth trembling, halfway between crying and not crying.

“We will see you,” she whispered, rubbing Cas’ back. “Dean, Sammy and me, we’ll visit you. Hell, if you move close, we can still pick you up from school.”

Castiel pulled away. “I want to walk home,” he said, sniffing back dribbly snot. “All the other kids get to walk.”

Mary wanted to argue, but she was torn: firstly, was she really meant to be overprotective with a kid who had psychological problems billowing out of his ears, or was she meant to give him space and independence? Secondly, Cas wasn’t her kid, not legally, not biologically. She had no place parenting him at all. But... what were the rules when the real parent wasn’t good enough at the job to do it herself?

For a long time, Mary had believed that Johanna wasn’t a bad parent. The only damage she’d done was deprive her son of material things, not the essentials for living, and that only made him miserable because he could see he wasn’t as well off as those around him.

But the longer Mary had thought about it, she came to realise that it was Johanna’s overbearing control that had driven Castiel to such disturbing lengths. Every day he’d been left alone. Yes, Johanna was out to work, to buy food, to keep shelter over their heads – but at what cost? Mary shook her head. She knew poverty and neglect could be emotionally devastating to a kid, no matter the reasons for it.

God. No wonder Cas liked to burn things. He could be in control of one tiny thing for a little while. He wanted control as much as his mother did.

Mary rubbed at her face, breathing out slowly. “When do you move?”

Castiel took his chocolate milk and swallowed half the glass before answering. “October first.”

Mary clawed her hands back through her hair, undoing the clip at the back. “That’s less than two weeks away.”

“Yeah. I found the paper about a month ago.”

“You’ve been sitting on this for a month?! How did you go so long without telling me? Or Dean?”

Castiel stared into the chocolately depths of his glass and shrugged. “I’m good at keeping secrets.”

Mary touched his head, stroking. “Your mom is too, I’m guessing.”

Castiel nodded. “I don’t like her. And I like her even less when she takes her pills.”

Now Mary felt terrible. She slipped her hand away from Cas and held her own hands between her knees, staring at the blank TV. “Cas,” she said, shutting her eyes. “Look, I don’t know what her pills do, but you’ve gotta hold out and hope. If she’s sick, she might get better, maybe. I’m sure the Mamma you know and the person she’s meant to be are very different.”

That’s rich, coming from you, said her own voice in her head. What about John? He was meant to be a nice young man, a giver. Jack Daniels and Jim Beam made him someone else, right? A drunken monster wasn’t who he was meant to be, either.

“That’s different,” Mary said aloud, and her eyes shot to Castiel’s when he looked at her in confusion. “Shh,” she said, stroking back his hair. “My brain is just trying to tell me I’m a hypocrite.”

Castiel either knew what ‘hypocrite’ meant already, or he didn’t care; he nodded, then drank the last of his milk. In silence, Mary reached for her orange juice and sipped, full of doubt and worry.

Dean looked strange when he came out of the bathroom, but Mary couldn’t put a finger on what it was. She applied Occam’s Razor and figured he’d put on some makeup while he was in there – and hey, she had to hand it to him: he must’ve done it well for her not to notice right off the bat.

Come dinner, with a birthday pizza steaming on the coffee table, Mary wasn’t so sure it was makeup. Dean looked... odd. Kind of drawn, and his mannerisms were somewhat slanted. Sam looked fine, but Dean...

While Cas was muttering about how cool the birthday message on the pizza box was, and how nice the pizza people were to make his birthday pizza just right (i.e. exactly to Mary’s specifications), Mary slipped into the bathroom.

She checked the cupboards, looking for any medication she might’ve accidentally left lying around. Nothing. Nothing new in the trash, either.

She checked her makeup bag, but she remembered the position of the things inside from that morning, and concluded it hadn’t been touched.

Properly worried now, she left the bathroom and went to check on Dean again. He wasn’t smiling, even though Cas was. The bee plushie was wearing the party hat, and Cas was jabbering away happily, like nothing he’d admitted to Mary was affecting him.

Dean just didn’t look at all cheerful. Maybe he was coming down with a bug. Or, revisiting Occam’s Razor, he could be tired after a long day.

“I think it’s time for bed,” Mary said, closing up the pizza box. “I’ll take a photo of this box, Cas, so even when it’s thrown away you’ll still get to see it.”

Castiel reached for it to look at it again, and Mary watched him smile at the bubble writing on the cardboard. Have a buzzzzzing birthday! it read, also to Mary’s specifications. If she’d had extra cash in her wallet, she would’ve tipped the pizza guy twice over.

Soon enough, she had Dean in his pyjamas and Sam in a clean onesie, but Cas had nowhere to go yet, so he was sitting quietly on the couch, kicking his bare heels against the bulk of it.

Dean went and sat next to him, snuggling against his side. Mary almost thought he’d thrown off whatever was bugging him before, but even with a James Bond movie on the TV, he didn’t smile. His eyes looked dull.

Castiel cuddled with him, their arms holding onto each other, Castiel’s cheek on Dean’s head. Dean closed his eyes against Castiel’s shoulder, and didn’t move for nearly twenty minutes.

Mary watched them from the kitchen, scrubbing dishes and thinking about ten different things a second.

It was nearly eight o’clock when someone knocked on the door. Mary put down her folder of job applications and took off her glasses, crossing the room quickly.

Johanna stood in the hall, as thin and tired as yesterday, and every other day. She beckoned wordlessly to Castiel where he sat on the couch, and clicked her fingers when he didn’t come straight away.

“Johanna,” Mary said slowly, “I have a favour to ask you.”

“Hm? Castiel, come on. You need a bath.”

“Could he stay here tonight?” Mary asked. “A slumber party, perhaps.”

Johanna shook her head. “He’s too young for that.”

“I’m not, Mamma,” Castiel said from beside Mary, holding the back pocket of her jeans. “I can do things by myself, I’m not a baby.”

“You can use that as an argument when you’re not begging at the foot of my bed like a dog every night.” She glanced at Mary, snorting. “He still gets nightmares, would you believe it.”

“I do believe it,” Mary said. “But, please. Just tonight. He’s had a – an exciting day.”

“All the more reason to come home and wind down, where there’s no distractions,” Johanna said, testily. She thrust out a skeletal hand and tried to grab at Castiel. “Unless you come with me right now, you’re not getting your Christmas present.”

Mary winced internally, recognising the same threat from last year. “Don’t take that from him,” she said quietly, while Castiel continued to hide behind her. “There are better ways to encourage obedience than to threaten taking away what little he has.”

That struck a nerve; Johanna glared at Mary with the same furious blue eyes that Castiel had. “It’s none of your business what I do or don’t allow him,” she said. “It’s never been your business, and it’s never been your right to give him what I don’t allow. I’ve noticed his weight gain; his teeth have chocolate on them when I brush them. Don’t you dare go assuming it slips by me every single time you enable him. No wonder he’s so screwed up, you don’t punish him at all for his crimes.”

“He’s eight!” Mary shouted. “They’re not crimes, they’re cries for help! You can’t brush his teeth for him, he needs to do that himself! You can’t keep him controlled because you have no idea what he’s going through. I get that you can’t help it, but Christ, woman! Try offering rewards for good behaviour instead of constant punishment for bad. You need to know what kind of damage you’re doing!” Mary squinted and tossed out a last hiss: “And, for the record, he’s a healthy weight for his age and height.”

Johanna looked stunned for a second, then a frown descended over her like a stormcloud. “How dare you. I forbid you from seeing my son. I will pick him up from school myself, I’ll quit my job if I have to!”

“Well, good!” Mary blared. “Maybe I’ve done right after all, you’ve finally got the message!”

“Noo,” came a terrible wail from behind Mary. She spun around and saw Castiel with tears streaming down his face, his bee plushie tight in his arms. “Noo, no-ho-hoo...”

Mary felt a block of regret sitting heavy in her gut. She’d driven Johanna into spending more time with her son, and that wasn’t— maybe never had been a good thing. Mary thought she might weep, seeing Cas so upset, and at her hands. He’d trusted her with information on his mother and she’d blown it.

“Come, Castiel,” Johanna barked, hand struck out from her body to grab her son. She wrestled the plushie from him and threw it back inside the apartment. “Now.”

Castiel went unwillingly, utter hopelessness written clear as day on his face. He wanted to be rescued but Mary didn’t have the power to do so. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, watching him tugged past.

Maybe one last try—

“Wait,” Mary called to Johanna.

Johanna looked back, and never did she look more like a vulture. Pretty, yes, but contorted from within by something she had little control over, the same way she never really had control over her son.

Mary took a sharp breath before speaking. “Today is September eighteenth.”

Johanna gave no reaction, and Mary wondered if Cas had lied again. But Mary gave him the benefit of the doubt this time, and pressed on: “Today is your son’s birthday.”

“Oh, I know,” Johanna said, with forced lightness. “It may have been eight long years, but I don’t suppose I could ever forget pushing this little shit out of me.”

Mary’s jaw steeled, and she looked down at the sniffling little boy, wrist clamped in Johanna’s hand. Mary tried to say goodbye, wish him a happy birthday, but Johanna flung him into their own room and slammed the door behind them.

Mary shut her own door and covered her face with her hands, hugely upset by the past few minutes. The two weeks they had left to share with each other had been ripped and shredded down to nothing, and there was probably nothing she could do about it, not without risking arrest.

She looked up through watering eyes, and saw that Sammy was sitting in his crib, probably put there by Dean. He sang to Mary, “Night-night,” but Mary wandered over, unable to reply.

She gave Sammy a kiss and lay him down, covering him over with his blanket. She turned the main light off at the wall, turned on Dean’s lamp on the nightstand. But Dean wasn’t in bed, and he wasn’t on the couch, either.

Checking Sammy one last time, Mary left him alone and went to look for Dean. The hotel room wasn’t large, it ought not take more than a minute. She checked the other side of the couch, and she checked under the beds. She checked in the kitchen, then, lastly, moved to the bathroom.

Dean was not in the bathroom.

Mary’s heart began to thump against her ribs. There was nowhere else for Dean to be except—

She ran to the balcony and threw open the doors, but this space was so small, she could barely stand there with the doors open without feeling squashed. Dean clearly wasn’t out here, and she heard nothing but sirens in the distance and rushing night air.

She shut her eyes tight, then looked over the balcony. Nothing but darkness, and a golden light over tarmac six storeys below. She let out a breath of mystified relief. If he wasn’t here, where was he?

She left the hotel room with Sammy in her arms, hushing him when he murmured sleepily.

She took the elevator down, and went straight to the front desk.

“Yael,” she said, and Yael turned around.

“You look like the sky just fell,” Yael said, without a smile in sight. “What happened?”

“Dean’s missing,” Mary breathed, bouncing Sam on her hip as he gradually became more disturbed by the light in the lobby. “Johanna and me had a fight – an argument. She said— She said we can’t see Cas again, I think Dean took off, I don’t know where he went, I don’t know how he got out— He was on the couch and then I turned around and he wasn’t there and oh fuck he wasn’t there before and I only just noticed he wasn’t there—”

“Calm yourself, girl.” Yael grasped Mary’s shoulders, brown eyes holding her gaze. “Easy now,” she said. “Deep breath.”

Mary took a deep but shaking breath, and Sam whined.

Yael nodded when Mary exhaled. “He’s over by the fish,” she said with a small smile. “Kid told me you sent him down here. He looks a wreck, though, and now I guess I know why.”

Mary cupped Yael’s neck with a hand in thanks, breath rushing from her lungs. She handed Sam to her, and whispered her thanks when Yael took Sam without complaint.

Mary hurried for the fish, the single corner beaming with shades of blue in an otherwise ruby-red entrance room. The sound of trickling water became obvious the closer she got, and she entered the black-ceilinged alcove with her heart pounding. When she saw the small, hunched figure in the corner between two tanks, bathed in blue lights, she jogged to meet him. She fell to her knees on the brushed concrete, touching Dean’s shoulder with a hand.

He was crying, and he’d been crying for a long time. His eyes were red-rimmed, his cheeks ruddy and sore, and he looked completely heartbroken.

“Oh, honey,” Mary whispered, sprawling into an awkward sitting position beside her son, grasping him bodily and pulling him in for a hug. She kissed his head, smelling pizza on him, and an unhappy warmth, like a fever.

“He’s leaving,” Dean sobbed against Mary’s shoulder. Her top was already salty from Castiel’s tears earlier, and a few more were welcomed by the cotton she wore. “Mom, Cas is moving away.”

Suddenly Dean’s peculiar behaviour for the evening made sense. “You overheard,” Mary said. “You were listening after I told you not to.”

“Cas was crying,” Dean wailed, hugging Mary so tight her breasts hurt, but she bore with the pain; Dean’s was worse. “Cas was crying and I wanted to know why.”

“There’ll be a way to see him again,” Mary said, despite not knowing that for sure. “He’s your best friend, Dean—”

“He’s my only friend,” Dean said, lifting his face. Mary dried his face with her sleeve, but more tears came. “Nobody stays friends with me for long. I made friends with Jemma, ‘cause she was new and Miss Grosby said she needed a buddy. But then she didn’t want to play Harry Potter any more, and now she’s friends with Stacey and they don’t like me.”

“I’m sure they still like you, Dean. You’re amazing.”

“They said I should go away and play football with the other boys.”

Mary frowned. “Don’t you?”

Dean shook his head, swollen lips pressed together. He sniffed, wiping his cheeks with the backs of his hands.

“But,” Mary said, “you told me that bruise on your ribs the other week was from playing football during lunch break.”

Dean stiffened. “Yeah, it was,” he said, too quickly. “I— I played football once. And I got a bruise so I didn’t play again.”

It seemed believable, but Mary was well aware that the mark of a good lie was its believability. Rather than tackling Dean’s lie face-on, she edged around it. Probably not very subtly, but oh well. “Does anyone at school hurt you?”

Dean was still and quiet for a second, then he shook his head. “I’m just kinda clumsy.”

Funny, Mary thought. Dean had never been clumsy.

Mary rested her chin in her hand, and she watched the fish for a while, mulling over too many thoughts. “Today’s been a really stressful day,” she said. “First Cas going missing, then you...”

“I’m sorry,” Dean said quietly. “I left by the secret door. Cas told me not to tell you about it, but I think today things really came to a head.”

Mary smirked at Dean’s phrasing. “You’ll have to show me where that secret door is.”

Dean gave a noncommittal nod.

“Come on, we’d better get you to bed. You have school tomorrow.”

Dean sighed, cheeks in his hands. “I don’t wanna.”

“School or bed?”

“Both.”

Mary got to her feet, holding out her hands and wiggling her fingers at Dean. “We all gotta do things we don’t want to,” she said. “Life’s not fair, and life sucks like you wouldn’t believe.”

“Life sucks really-really-really bad,” Dean said, taking Mary’s hands and letting her pull him to his feet. She grunted, stumbling back a step once he was standing.

“Boy, you’ve grown,” she chuckled, ruffling Dean’s light brown hair. “It’s like every time I blink you get a little taller, little smarter. And your hair is getting darker, too.”

“Maybe one day I’ll look like Cas,” Dean said, trudging over to the front desk with his hands in his pockets. He looked up at Mary hopefully, eyes at last seeming clearer. “Or maybe I’ll look like you.”

“You don’t wanna look like me,” Mary smiled, taking Sam from Yael. Now her hands were full, she gave the other woman a quick kiss on the cheek in thanks. “I’m getting old way before my time.”

Yael blinked confusedly, fingers touching her cheek, where Mary had kissed her. “Girl, the hell are you talking about? You look like a goddamn goddess, get outta here.” She grinned and waved Mary away, and Mary wore a good smile as she led her troupe back to the elevator.

Dean was quiet on the way up, arms folded, mouth turned down. When his face lost its flush, his freckles became visible again – but his eyelashes were wet when they got back to their room. Mary said nothing about his silent tears. He was broken inside and there was nothing she could do.

Dean woke up with a gasp. He saw his crayon drawing of a pumpkin stuck beside his bed, carved jaws open in a way that was supposed to be menacing, but it only looked like it was yawning. Dean blinked twice and shut his eyes again. He wanted to cry. But he couldn’t, in case Mom heard.

Rolling over in bed, Dean scowled at the wet squish he felt all around his middle. He threw the comforter back and took off his soaked pyjama pants, tossing them into the puddle before reaching to strip the bedsheets.

He didn’t need to turn his lamp on to see, because Mom had left the kitchen light on. She left it on a lot recently. She worked at night as well as during the day, sitting perched on a stool, using the kitchen worktop as a desk. Dean wasn’t sure when she slept nowadays. Sometimes he wondered if she ever did.

Right now she was on the phone, head bent down, her blonde hair a complete mess, glasses pushed up over her forehead. She was holding a pen, and she was getting ink on her cheek.

With his sheets in a bundle, waddling with his knees wide, Dean carried the bundle towards the laundry hamper in the bathroom. Mom noticed him and glanced up, muttering into the phone, “Yeah, yeah. Look, I completely understand, I know the risks.” A pause. “Sir, you have to understand, the answer’s still yes. The answer will always be yes.”

Dean knew Mom was watching him. She knew he’d wet the bed again. It had happened every night since Castiel left. They didn’t talk about it any more.

Mom said, “All right. Mm-hm, I’ll be there in the morning. Just tell me the address.”

Dean closed the bathroom door just as Mom reached for a notepad. Blinking sleepily, Dean got into the bath, took off his underwear and had a quick shower. He kept his head out of the water, his mind void of all thoughts. He sighed, turned off the shower, then stepped out to get a towel.

Dean was reaching for a fresh set of underwear and pyjamas (they kept those in the bathroom now, it was easier), when he heard Mom knock on the door.

“Honey, you okay?”

“Yeah,” Dean said tiredly.

“When you’re out, can I talk to you for a second? I know it’s the middle of the night, but I have something important to tell you.”

“‘Kay,” Dean replied. He got dressed, then wrapped his towel around his shoulders like a blanket and went out into the kitchen. He made a beeline for the fridge, taking out some chocolate milk, then getting a cup to pour it into. A little slopped over the side, but it was the middle of the night so he didn’t care. He didn’t even put the milk back.

“Let’s put some fresh sheets on your bed, yeah?” Mom said, already on the job. Dean just stood by and watched, nose in his cup as he sip-sip-sipped without pausing.

“What were you dreaming about?” Mom asked, flapping the comforter out so it hung neatly over the bed.

Dean shrugged a shoulder. “I forgot my coat when I went outside. Got water in my boots.”

Mom smiled knowingly. “That is a terrifying prospect, isn’t it? October weather’s chilly.”

“No, it’s not terrifying, it’s stupid,” Dean mumbled. He finished his milk and clung to the glass, watching the creamy remainders collect in a ring at the bottom. Slowly, he felt fatigue and misery clench tight in his throat, and all at once, tears stung in his eyes. “I... I miss Cas.”

“Oh, Dean...” Mom sighed. “It won’t be like this forever,” she soothed, sitting on Dean’s newly-made bed, beckoning to him with both hands. “Things will get better, I promise.” Dean went to her, resting his cheek on her shoulder, body pressing into her chest as she squeezed him. Eyes closed, Dean sighed.

“I’m worried about him,” Dean whispered. “He never writes back to my letters. What if he’s lonely? Or he gets nightmares and he can’t come hug me afterwards? I always dream about him. And it’s not the same playing with Sam.”

“Cas was special, huh.”

Dean nodded against his mom’s neck, feeling tears run down his cheeks. “I miss him so bad.”

“Dean,” Mom said softly, “Listen...” She sighed. “I was going to tell you something now, but if I do you’ll be wide awake all night. So I want you to get back into bed, go back to sleep. I’m going to ask Yael to babysit in the morning – I need to go out – but I’ll be back by lunch. And we’ll talk then, okay?”

“Is it a surprise?” Dean mumbled, nosing Mom’s soft sweater.

“Mm-hm.” Mom’s smile danced in her voice. “A good surprise. Well, there’s bad and good. But you’ll be happy.”

“Hm.” Dean was already falling asleep, safe in his mother’s arms.

He barely noticed Mom lying him in bed and tucking him in. But he felt her lips kiss his forehead, and he fell asleep with that touch replicated in his dreams.

Castiel watched his mother’s hands stroke down his shoulders, smoothing out the wrinkles in his new woolly sweater. It had been someone else’s before – but it was new to Castiel. He touched its ribbed hem, smiling at its softness.

“Do you like it?” Mamma asked.

Castiel nodded. “It’s warm.”

“Good. That’s good.” Mamma had a smile on her lips, but her lips were thin, and a smile was hard to see. “I really splurged today,” she confessed, fretting with Castiel’s collar. “I got you a new coat too, do you want to see?”

Castiel’s eyes widened in excitement. “Yes! I mean—” he sobered, “I mean, yes please, Mamma.”

Mamma laughed softly, almost uncomfortably. “What’s with you recently?” she asked. She turned to get a bag from beside her bed, bringing it up to her lap. “You’re so well-behaved. It’s very unlike you.”

Castiel shrugged, head down.

He didn’t want to say. She took him away from Mary and Sam and Dean because he’d been so bad. Maybe if he was good, she’d let him see Dean again. But he didn’t want to say.

Mamma sighed, holding up the new coat. “Look at this. Yellow is your favourite, isn’t it?”

Castiel felt a flip in his tummy. “Yes!” he said, reaching for the translucent plastic coat with both hands. He laughed, holding it to his face. He could see his mother’s grin through it. And he could see their tiny apartment and the bright window to outside, all yellow.

“Put it on,” Mamma suggested. “Here, I’ll help.”

Castiel jumped to turn around, hands back so Mamma could slide to coat on. As he held down the wrists of his new sweater, the coat went smoothly up his arms. It sat neatly on his shoulders, and he could hear it scrunching and squeaking as he turned his head. He grinned, looking down at himself. He swung from side to side, watching the coat’s hem bat at his knees.

“You look very handsome, don’t you?” Mamma said proudly.

“There’s a hood on the back!” Castiel exclaimed, tipping his head back to make the hood stick to his hair.

Mamma observed Castiel’s excitement for a while, smiling, keeping her bony hands on her knees. She nodded when he spoke, and she touched his hair when it became staticky, and she laughed when it stung her. But when Castiel asked, “How come I got a new coat today?” her smile fell.

“Come sit,” she said, beckoning to Castiel, then patting the couch beside her. Castiel went without hesitation.

“I know you’re aware, I’m not very well,” Mamma said solemnly. She addressed Castiel’s sweater, not his eyes, but Castiel assumed she was talking to him. He nodded. Mamma nodded too, and went on, “Medicine can only help a certain amount. And the medicine costs so much, I have to spend all my time working...”

She trailed off, and closed her mouth tight. She shook her head. “The coat is a gift,” she explained. “I wanted to give you one last thing... before...”

She went quiet, then began again. “I haven’t been here when you needed me, Castiel,” she said softly. This time she met his eyes, and Castiel saw they were shiny with tears. “Every day I’d see you, you’d grown since the last day. Even now, you’re getting taller. But you haven’t eaten. You’re sad, I can see it.”

Castiel took a breath to disagree, but thought better of lying. He was miserable, and this was the first time Mamma had acknowledged the fact.

“I missed the important things,” Mamma said. “You started to become a stronger person. All the things you learned in school. All the trouble you caused – and all the reasons for it. And you made a friend... a very special friend. I missed hearing about him, too.”

Castiel looked down, feeling his heart ache at the thought of Dean.

“The problems we have, they go beyond us moving away,” Mamma sighed. “It’s not about the house. It doesn’t seem to matter what I do for you now, how much I give you. You don’t trust me. And I don’t blame you. Please... I... I want to apologise, Castiel. For not being the parent you needed.”

Castiel chewed on his tongue, watching his fingers curl together on his knees. He wasn’t sure how to respond.

“I’m sorry for leaving you alone... then being angry when you found better, more engaging things to do with your time. I’m sorry I never understood why you did the things you did. And I’m sorry that my apologies won’t mean much to you. The best thing I can do now is fix what I can. First and foremost, that means me.”

Castiel looked up, interested.

Mamma had a serious look in her eye now. “Castiel, I’m going to go away for a while. To a special hospital. They’ll make sure I eat the right things, and take the right medicine. But if I do that, it means everything has to change. The house we’re in now, we can’t keep it. And you—” Mamma’s voice cracked and became breathy. “I want you to be safe. I want you to be looked after. So I’ve made arrangements...”

Her hands took Castiel’s elbows, gently, but reassuringly. “You’re going to be very happy in your new home, okay? I promise you that. It won’t be forever, but... it could be, if that’s what you want. I’d understand if you made that choice. I love you... I love you, with all my heart, baby – but maybe I’m not the person you need in your life. I just want you to be happy. I want you to be happy.”

Castiel wasn’t completely sure what all this meant, but he nodded, feeling warm tears trickle down his cheeks. He let his mother hug him, and he hugged her back, both plasticky yellow arms around the dark tresses of her hair. He felt her sobbing, and he heard her whisper, once more, “I love you.”

Yael helped Dean put the finishing touches on his Halloween costume. A pink sequin here, a purple cloth patch there. Now it hung from the back of the hotel room’s door, half the size of Mom’s witchy black gown. Sam’s pumpkin costume was on an even smaller hanger, dangling from a handle on Mom’s chest of drawers.

“You’re gonna be the talk of the town, wearing that,” Yael promised Dean, ruffling his hair.

“Is that a good thing?” Dean asked warily.

Yael’s laugh made Dean grin. “Hell yeah it is, kid.”

“Can I put mine on now?” Sam asked, tugging on Yael’s pants leg. “We have to be ready to go.”

“We’re not going Trick-or-Treating until after four o’clock, Sammy,” Dean said. “We haven’t even had lunch yet.”

“I wanna go Trickle Treating nowww,” Sam complained.

“Guess you don’t want lunch then?” Dean said, eyebrows up. “Oh, more for me! Om nom nom—”

“No!” Sam scampered up to Dean, snatching away his paper plate of chicken wings and baked tomatoes. Dean laughed, watching his little brother run away to eat on the couch, watching Sesame Street reruns. He was four now, but he still loved the show as much as when he was two.

“Careful of sticky fingers!” Yael warned Sam from across the room. “I don’t want to clean the couch again.”

“Hey, Yael?” Dean said, hopping up onto Mom’s kitchen stool, intending to eat while reading a cookbook. “Did Mom talk to you before she went out?”

Yael came closer, rolling up her shirt sleeves so she could do some washing up. “She sure did,” she said mysteriously. “Why’d you ask?”

“Well,” Dean said, trying to act innocent as he shoved homemade fries in his mouth, “you wouldn’t happen to know where she went, would you?”

Yael grinned, giving Dean a knowing look. “Why, Dean, are you interrogating me?”

“No, I’m pressing you for information,” Dean replied. “Tell me what you know.”

“Mary’ll tell you when she gets back.”

“Yeah, but,” Dean’s cheeks bulged as he chewed, “I’m impatient.”

“Sometimes in life, you gotta wait,” Yael said. “Eventually good things come around. Like your new house.”

Dean’s eyes drifted to the cookbook. He didn’t want to think about the new house. “I like living here.”

“Your mom worked hard for years so you’d be able to move forward, Dean.” Yael almost dropped a soapy plate, but caught it in time. She looked back over her shoulder, giving Dean a brave smile. “I know you like it here, but wouldn’t it be better to live in a real house, with your own bedroom?”

“I like sharing,” Dean said.

“Ah,” Yael said. “Well, that’s too bad.” She said it strangely though, like she knew more than she was letting on. It was probably true, Dean supposed. Adults often talked like that.

“If we live somewhere else, we won’t see you any more,” Dean said, dragging a fry around his plate, mopping up tomato juice. “I’d miss you. A-And Cas is already gone, and then if you go too—”

“Oh, you’ll still see me,” Yael said lightly. “A few miles ain’t nearly enough to keep me away from you two troublemakers. Not to mention your mom.”

Dean looked up, hearing something interesting in Yael’s tone. “What about my mom?”

Yael suddenly looked sheepish. “I shouldn’t be talking about it, really.”

“Oh, come on, give me something,” Dean lamented. “This is the worst investigation ever.”

Yael laughed. “You’re not doing James Bond proud yet, are you?”

Dean shook his head, sulking. He eyed his last fry, lifting it between two fingers to stare at it.

Slowly, Yael sighed. “Well, I suppose you’ll only find out anyway. Your mom and I— We— Well, we’ve known each other a very long time, and we’ve gotten close – like friends do – but—”

Dean sat up straight. “Are you getting married?”

“What? Hell no!” Yael put down a half-washed spatula, rinsed her hands and turned off the tap, then angled herself round to look Dean directly in the eye. “No plans to get married, no way, no how – not anytime soon. But we were considering that maybe we could... date. We weren’t too sure, see. We didn’t know how Sam and you might take things.”

“Dating’s like when you kiss and hug and you’re all gross, right?”

Yael chuckled, drying her hands on a tea towel. “That’s all you think we’d do, huh? Would it bother you if we were like that?”

Dean screwed up his face. “Mmm. I dunno.” He squirmed in his seat, then ate his last fry. “If you were dating, would you come over to our new house to help Mom make pies?”

“That’s real specific.”

“It’s a yes-no question, it’s not complicated.”

Yael laughed again, moving to lean on the kitchen counter beside Dean. She stretched out a hand to see the cookbook Dean was reading, and discovered it was a book full of pies.

Finally, Yael nodded. “Tell me which pie is your favourite, and maybe I’ll make one just for you.”

Dean began to grin, and his grin broadened. “In that caaase... Yes. I officially approve of you dating Mom. Just don’t get all icky and lovey-dovey and weird, please. I’m only seven-and-a-half, I don’t want to see that.”

“What if I made two pies, could I kiss your mom then?”

Dean blinked. He thought about that, then nodded. “For that price, I’m sure I could get used to it.”

“Sounds like we got ourselves a deal,” Yael said, holding out her hand for Dean to shake.

Dean shook, then giggled when Yael yelped at the feeling of food grease transferred to her hand.

Mom had a peculiar look in her eye when she came home. She seemed frazzled, far more tired than usual, but she also spoke brightly, and gave Yael a long, happy hug. Then she gave Sammy an even longer hug, and finally she turned to Dean and beckoned him close with one finger.

“Yael already told me the surprise,” Dean announced.

Mom looked startled, and her eyes shot to Yael. “She did?”

“Yeah, you’re going to go out dating.” Dean stuck his hands on his hips and gave his mom a good, hard stare. “Look, I’m all on board for a relationship – but no funny business, okay? Maybe kissing. But don’t be gross.”

Mom burst out laughing, one hand covering her mouth. “Oh, oh my gosh – Dean. You grew up so fast. Where did the time go...”

Dean stood taller. He might wet the bed every night, but right now he was the oldest and cleverest he’d ever been, and that made him feel mature. Maybe James Bond would be proud now.

“No, honey,” Mom said now, her tone softening. “That wasn’t the surprise. It was something Yael and I had been meaning to talk to you about, but... there’s something else.” Mom went over to the couch, and Dean followed. In the meantime, Yael broke away, going to see what Sam was calling for.

Dean sat down next to his mom, hands neatly on the scuffed knees of his jeans. He waited for her to talk. She seemed to be struggling to find words.

“There was a call for me, late last night,” Mom started, staring at the carpet. “It was someone from a hospital, a special kind of hospital. Someone we know got sick, more sick than before.”

Dean’s eyes widened.

“Castiel’s mom,” Mom said, looking at Dean solemnly. “She’s fine, thank God – well, physically, that is. She’s not going to die or anything. But she is going to be in psychiatric care and rehabilitation for a number of months. There’s lots of doctors looking after her.”

Dean’s heart was pounding now. What did this mean? What would happen now? Was Cas okay?

Mom swallowed. “The reason I got the phone call – the reason I got any call at all...” A smile flickered on her lips. “I couldn’t even believe it when I found out. Auntie Jo put down my name as her emergency contact. When she was healthier, she even signed a sort of document, a will, saying that if anything happened to her—” Mom’s breath fluttered, still smiling. “She entrusted Castiel’s care to me.”

Both of Dean’s hands flew to his mouth, he sat up straight, huffing through his fingers. He knew what it meant. He knew it. He couldn’t believe it.

Mom laughed gently, eyes watering with tears. “That’s where I went today, I went to sign some papers, accepting guardianship. I hope with all my heart that Auntie Jo will get better someday, and she’ll be capable of looking after Castiel the way he needs. But, Dean, there is a very real chance that Castiel may choose not to go back to her. He has the right to choose. And you know what he’ll pick. I know it. The man I talked to last night who handed me the documents today, he knew it. It’s possible we might be keeping Castiel forever.”

Dean couldn’t stand it any longer – he leapt onto the couch and jumped on it like a trampoline, shouting and yelling for joy. “Yeeee! We’re adopting Caa-as! We’re adopting Caa-as!” he sang, prancing in circles. He bounced off the couch and ran to Sammy, picking him up an inch off the ground. “We’re adopting Caa-as! Sammy, we’re getting Cas back!”

“Woohoo! Kitty!” Sam cheered, and joined Dean in his loud and energetic parade across the entire hotel room, tooting like he had an invisible kazoo.

“Kii-tty! Kii-tty! Kii-tty!” came the chant. Mom and Yael sat back on the couch, laughing, arms around each other, joining in with clapping hands. “Kii-tty! Kii-tty! Ki-tty!”

Dean put on his Halloween costume like it was a uniform. He stood in front of the floor-length mirror on the back of the door, brushing down his chaps, adjusting his hat.

“Yael did a good job, huh,” Mary said, sidling up to Dean and admiring his reflection. “She’s a good seamstress. Better than I’ll ever be.”

“Why don’t they make pink cowboy costumes?” Dean asked, peering down at the triangle of cloth that was pinned to either side of his brown waistcoat. His hat sparkled with fuchsia glitter as he looked back at the mirror.

“Who knows,” Mary shrugged, putting a warm hand on top of Dean’s hat. “Are you sure you’re comfortable? You’re going to be wearing this for a few hours. We need to collect Castiel before we can go Trick-or-Treating.”

“I’m fine, Mom,” Dean said. “It’s Sam you should be worried about. He’s gonna be sick of being a pumpkin by the time we get to the park.”

Mary’s eyebrows jumped towards her bangs. “He’s always a pumpkin. A costume won’t change much.”

Dean laughed, looking up at his mom with love in his eyes. “I won’t tell him you said that.”

Mary winked.

Dean took one more look at his reflection, stomping about in his new pink boots. He thought he looked very handsome, but he wasn’t sure he liked it. Not completely. “H... Hey, Mom?”

“Mm?”

Dean gulped, then peered up pleadingly. “Can I put some makeup on? Just a little bit. For the costume! Pleeease.”

Mary tilted her head slightly. “Dean, you know you already look beautiful, right?”

“Duh,” Dean scoffed. “I just...” He took a small breath. “It’s just, I haven’t seen Cas in a whole month. I... I wanna look nice.”

“Heyyy,” Mary crouched down, hands rising to tidy Dean’s collar. “Cas is going to be so happy to see you. You don’t need to impress him by changing how you look, Dean. Your freckles are perfect, and your eyes are already pretty.”

“No... No, I want more freckles,” Dean explained. “And I want my eyes to be more pretty. Can I put mascara on?”

Mary considered his pouty lip and puppydog eyes, and she started to smile. “Oh, how can I argue with that face? Come on, I’ll do it for you. I don’t think ‘clown cowboy’ is what you’re going for.”

“I wanna be a fairy princess cowboy,” Dean said, taking Mary by the hand and pulling her faster towards the bathroom. “With glitter. Lots of glitter.”

“I think we can manage that,” Mary smiled.

There were only a few kids at the park. Dean stayed beside his mother on a bench, hands tucked under his thighs to keep them warm. He kinda wanted to play on the monkey bars, but he’d grown so much this past year that his toes would skim the ground if he tried. Twice this month he’d tried to go on the slide and some four-year-old informed him he was too old for the slide. Frankly, that hurt Dean’s feelings, and he didn’t want to invite some other kid’s attempt to make him feel unwelcome. And so he sat. He watched other kids play.

“Castiel won’t be here for a few minutes, I’ll call you when he arrives,” Mom said encouragingly. “You don’t have to wait with me.”

“I’m fine,” Dean said. “It’s getting dark, anyway. The park might be full of unsavoury types.”

Mom chuckled, but it wasn’t a full laugh. “You’re too sensible for your own good,” she remarked, reaching to stroke Dean’s back. “Remember when you used to be reckless? I almost miss that. Well, I don’t actually. But almost.”

Dean looked down at his knees. His tummy was full of fizzy feelings, like pop rocks and soda. Only a few minutes and then Cas would be here. A month apart had felt like a lifetime.

“Here, why don’t we light the jack-o-lanterns,” Mom suggested, pulling out two orange plastic orbs from the bag she’d brought along. She handed one to Dean, and he wriggled his fingers out from underneath him to take it. There was a switch on the bottom of the light: once thumbed across, the lantern lit up in a cheerful tangerine colour. A friendly gap-toothed pumpkin face was printed on the side, and there was a looped handle at the top, which Dean grasped as he swung the light happily.

“One for Cas, once he gets here,” Mom smiled, taking out a third lantern. The second, she handed to Sam, who was sitting on the dead grass, building houses for snails out of tiny sticks.

“The snails are having Halloween,” Sam said, putting his lantern at the centre of his mollusk village. A star of shadows was cast all around, making the lantern look like a kind of smiling shrine.

Dean looked up, feeling a cool breeze sting one side of his face. He could smell the sickly sweet aroma of candy corn, and in the distance he heard the jubilant shrieks of children chasing each other down residential streets. Dean swung his feet, excited for later.

Every other year in Dean’s living memory, they’d gone Trick-or-Treating within the confines of the Women’s Refuge hotel building, but this year they were going to visit the houses along the street they were moving to. In just a few weeks, they’d have new neighbours. A new beat to roam. New places to cause trouble. But for tonight, Dean just hoped he’d be given new types of candy.

The sun wasn’t down yet, but the clouds were dragged across the sky like someone raked them, and they were purple high up, pink further down. There were scratches of pumpkin-orange in there, and a pretty blue – and through the stripes, Dean saw the sun, bright as always, blurred into the mess of other colours. Despite the blanket that covered seemingly the whole world, it was still cold. And when the wind came, it got colder.

Dean’s teeth started to chatter. “Vuvuvuvuvuvuv,” he said.

“I brought your coat,” Mom said, already reaching for it.

“Nuh-uh, Mom,” Dean said, resisting Mom’s attempts to warm him. “It’s not a fairy princess cowboy coat. It’ll ruin the look.”

Mom snorted, but she put the coat back anyway, smiling. “Let me know when Fairy Princess Cowboy Dean wants high-tech protection from the harsh elements, okay?”

“‘Kay. Vuvuuvuvuvuvuv.”

“Excuse me,” said a voice. It was a big adult voice, made small by politeness. Mom turned around on the bench, and gasped.

Dean turned too – and promptly leapt off the bench, narrowly avoiding a snail house. “CAS!”

Dean sprinted around the bench, arms out to wrap his best friend in the whole wide world up in the biggest hug of all time.

“Cas Cas Cas Cas,” Dean sobbed, squeezing Castiel’s shoulders so tight. He pushed his face against Castiel’s neck and nuzzled him, glad for the burning warmth of his skin, since his nose felt icy.

“Dean,” Castiel sighed. He sounded so relieved, and quiet. He smelled like a thrift store.

“Hi, nice to meet you. I’m so glad you made it,” Mom said to the big man who brought Cas. They shook hands, and Dean watched through his blurry eyes. “Wow... I think it’s obvious how badly Dean missed him.”

Dean sniffled against Castiel’s neck, not sure why he was crying. For the whole month, he’d known implicitly how badly he missed Cas. He’d felt Castiel’s absence every time he smiled, every time he got told off, every time someone pushed him at school. He’d felt the loss physically, like he was hungry, but in his chest instead of his stomach. But now Cas was here, Dean felt his presence all over. In his clutching hands, fingers gripping Castiel’s plastic yellow raincoat. He felt it in his belly, which was so full of pop rocks and soda that he was sure he was floating a foot off the ground and might shoot off into the sky at any moment, like they did in science class once. He felt it in his head, which was screaming CASCASCASCASCAS and it wouldn’t stop.

Cas’ smell was finally back in Dean’s nose, and Dean realised now how absolutely he’d been missing a part of himself while Cas was gone. Everything was alright now. So he cried. He didn’t even mind that his mascara and extra freckles and fairy glitter were all collecting on his chin.

Whatever Mom was saying to the man in a suit, it was a distant and jumbly noise. All that mattered was Castiel’s breathy sighs, each one more relieved than the last.

When Dean finally let go of Castiel, he pulled back enough to see his face. Cas was crying too, and smiling, all wobbly. He wiped his tears with the squishy part of his thumb, sniffing. Dean noticed there were multiple burn marks on Castiel’s hand, like the scar on Sam’s leg, but before Dean could ask about them, he was distracted by Sam, who pushed into their hug to wrap his arms around Castiel.

“Don’t ever leave again, Cas,” Sam said angrily.

“I— I won’t,” Castiel laughed, new tears spilling over his cheeks. Dean noticed he’d had a haircut, and he was quite a bit thinner than before. “I won’t, I promise.”

Once Castiel had stopped crying and dried his face for a second time, he reached to dry Dean’s tears too, smearing away the ruined makeup. Dean smiled.

“We brought you something,” Dean said, giving Castiel a ‘wait here’ gesture with a finger. He ran to Mom’s brown paper bag on the bench, rummaging through until he could pull out the biggest thing. He carried it gently to Castiel, and grinned broadly as he saw Castiel’s eyes light up.

“My bee!” Castiel shouted, reaching for it as Dean handed it over. Castiel hugged it so tightly it bulged, and Castiel promptly started crying again, snuggling his favourite toy with his whole face. Mom had washed it while Cas had been away; Dean knew it smelled like washing powder. So, essentially, it smelled like Heaven.

Castiel became overwhelmed by all of this, and he slowly sank down to kneel on the grass, rubbing his face on the soft fuzz of his plushie. He was shaking, and Dean instinctively moved to envelop him like a human blanket. Sam joined in too, giggling.

“This is gonna be the best Halloween ever,” Dean whispered. “Cas—” He pulled away, sitting down so Castiel could see him smile when he looked up. Their gazes met, and they shared a smile. “Cas, you’re not gonna believe this. We’re gonna live in a house! A real house. And Mom and Yael are gonna be gross, and we’re gonna eat pie, and go Trick-or-Treating, and then when it’s Christmas we’ll have lights all over the place and build snowmen and drink cocoa and eat marshmallows on pizza.”

“That’s icky, Dean,” Sam wrinkled his nose. “Mushmullows can’t go on pizza.”

“They do if you put them there,” Dean retorted. “Duh.”

Castiel sat there, beaming helplessly. He didn’t seem all too surprised by all this news – perhaps he’d already been told. But boy, did he look happy.

“You’re gonna have a Forever Home, Kitty,” Sam said, stroking Castiel’s hair. “Castiels are forever, not just for Halloween.”

Seeing Castiel’s lack of a costume hat under Sam’s comforting hand, Dean again clicked into action. “Oh!” he shouted, getting to his feet. “Cas, come see this stuff.”

Dean nearly tore the bag in his eagerness; he retrieved what he was looking for just as Castiel reached his side. Dean grinned, showing Castiel a headband, affixed with pair of springs with bobbing pom-poms on the ends. “So you can be a bee for Halloween,” Dean said, putting the headband on Castiel’s head for him. The pom-poms flooped and wibbled, and the sight of Castiel with antennae made Dean snicker.

“And these,” Dean added, reaching for a pair of elasticated butterfly wings they’d bought from the dollar store. “They were the last ones; I think lots of people wanted to be fairies this year.” Dean held the wings carefully; their netted material was delicate and easy to rip. “I was going to wear them, so I could be a fairy princess cowboy. But, um.” He offered them to Castiel. “I think you would be a good bee. I can just be a princess cowboy.”

Castiel took the wings with delight shining in his eyes. “Thank you,” he breathed.

Dean told him to turn around, and he helped Cas put the wings on over his raincoat. They were faintly pink, and had glitter glue in swirls around the edges. When Castiel jumped, the wings jumped with him. Castiel laughed, spinning in a circle to see the wings try to catch up.

“Watch out! Careful of my snails,” Sam said, grabbing Castiel’s arm so he didn’t squash one. “Here. Take this lantern. Then you can see.”

Indeed, the light was fading from the sky, and dusk gave the world a dull purple filter. Castiel held his orange lantern up next to his face, and he looked around the park, his face glowing the way a happy orange bug ought to.

“Hey... Um, M-Mary? M— Mom?” Castiel called to Dean’s mom. “Can we play on the slide?”

Mom took a moment to break from conversation with the big guy, but then she smiled. “Go ahead, sweetheart. Just take your lanterns so I can see where you are. Five minutes, then we’re going, okay?”

“Okay.” Castiel smiled. He put his plushie down on the bench, making sure it would be safe.

Dean eyed the play frame, only ten feet away. The other children were gone now, off with their parents to pilfer candy from house-dwellers. Dean was hesitant to play, even though Sam had already run off with his lantern, straight to the monkey bars. Castiel went more slowly, looking back, waiting for Dean.

Castiel stopped, and he returned to Dean’s side. “What’s wrong?”

“We’re too old to play on that,” Dean said.

Castiel frowned. “Says who?”

Dean took a while before he rolled a single shoulder in a shrug. “Just... people.”

“Well, people are wrong,” Castiel said bluntly. “And they’re misinformed, ignorant, and mean, and you’re never too old to have fun, in whatever manner you damn well please.”

Dean gulped. He began to smile. He went forward, taking Castiel’s hand as it was offered. Together, they ran towards the play frame, down the short grass slope and onto the wood chips. Dean no longer had any reservations; Castiel said it was okay to play, so it was.

Sam was already at the highest point on the frame, under the plastic dome, singing, “I’m the king of the ca-astle! You’re both dirty ra-ascals!”

Dean would have immediately stormed the castle and taken both its king and his jack-o-lantern prisoner, but his faithful knight, Sir Bee, had run off towards the plastic tunnel. Dean changed direction halfway to Sam’s turret, instead chasing Sir Bee.

Dean bumped into him, a foot inside the tunnel. Castiel laughed, falling with a plop onto his butt. Dean was so delighted to see him happy that he sat down too, just to look at him. Their smiling lanterns cast round illuminations all around, curved up the wall and over their heads.

“I really missed you,” Dean confessed, feeling his smile tug downwards, pulled by an intensity he had so rarely felt in his life. How was it possible to feel so much, just because of one person?

“I missed you too,” Castiel whispered back. His gaze lowered to the lanterns between them, blue eyes gleaming with wet speckles. “I never... I never want to be apart from you again,” Castiel said, such a weight on every word. “Even for a night.”

Dean nodded, understanding completely. “In our new house, we’ll share a bedroom. We can have our beds next to each other.”

“We should have the same bed,” Castiel said. “To save money.”

“Good idea,” Dean agreed. “When Sam got his own bed, Mom said it was too expensive.”

“So...” Castiel fidgeted. “If we live together, and we have the same mom, does that mean we’re brothers?”

Dean blinked, lips rounding as he pondered. “Maybe like friend brothers. Not real brothers.”

Castiel nodded once, satisfied with that. “So it’s not weird when we get married later.”

“Yeah.”

Castiel looked up, catching Dean’s eyes. They shared a brief, quiet moment, in which they both realised how perfectly their feelings aligned.

Dean managed a crooked smile, feeling his heart turn into a big red balloon. But Castiel didn’t just smile – he stared... and stared... and then lurched forward and smooched Dean right on the lips.

“Ow!” Dean jerked back, only then realising he wasn’t hurt, just surprised.

Castiel breathed out, suddenly pink-cheeked. His eyes were wide— Was he scared? He grabbed for his lantern and reversed down the plastic tunnel and out the other side, disappearing from Dean’s view.

“Cas? Cas, wait!” Dean shouted. He took his own lantern and backed out the side he’d come in, and looked around to see where Cas had gone. He saw a flash of orange moving on the other side of the darkened play frame, and he chased after it, heart pounding.

He knew what cheek kisses meant. But kisses on the lips were very, very different. They were special, and important. And Dean had just had his First Kiss. With Cas.

Dean rounded the ladder for the slide, reaching to grab the lantern-holding person. Only it wasn’t Castiel, it was Sam.

“Sammy, where’s Cas?” Dean asked, letting his brother go. “I need to find him, it’s life or death!”

“I dunno,” Sam said. “But this is my turf. En garde!”

“Okay, we’ll have a duel in a minute, Sammy,” Dean huffed, rushing past. There was Mom, sitting on the bench in her witch costume, still talking to the big guy in a suit. They were both holding flashlights. But where was Cas?

All at once, a huge light flashed on from above, and Dean gasped. The playground had a floodlight! Now he’d be able to see everything.

“Sammy, help me find Cas,” Dean said, already darting underneath the slide to begin his hunt. “You go that way, I’ll go this way!”

Sam ran off, and Dean lost him in a second. But he saw another light, a small orange glow from within Sam’s castle turret. Somehow, Sir Bee had infiltrated the castle without anyone noticing.

Dean approached gingerly, afraid he might startle Cas. Dean was tall enough to peer into the turret from where he stood, and he saw Cas sitting curled up, arms around his knees, face down between them. The handle of his jack-o-lantern was clutched so tightly in his fist that the lantern turned on its side.

Quiet like a ninja, Dean crept up the wooden stairs into the castle. He took off his glittery pink cowboy hat as a sign of respect, and he knelt beside his friend, examining him curiously.

“Hey... Cas?” Dean said gently.

“Nnh,” Castiel said.

Dean slid a hand over Castiel’s yellow raincoat, crumpling the slidy plastic hood. He touched Castiel’s wings, stroking a finger along the bendy wire edge.

Castiel lifted his head from his knees, eyes turning to Dean. He rested his cheek on his knee again, still gazing at Dean.

“Um,” Dean said.

Castiel blinked.

Dean waited a few more seconds, then inched forward, hoping he could kiss Castiel again. Castiel realised what was about to happen and he gasped, lifting his head— And Dean gave him a kiss, just as chaste and gentle as the first one.

Castiel blinked a half-dozen times as Dean pulled away. Dean felt like he was blushing brighter than his jack-o-lantern.

“Eeeew,” Sam cried, standing halfway along the chain bridge that led to the castle. “MOOOM! DEAN AND CAS KIIIIISSED.” He mimed throwing up.

“Saaa-am!” Dean whined, wishing he had something to throw at the snitch in a pumpkin costume. Sam was already running away, just in case Dean did find a projectile. He was gone in a flash, and the chain bridge was left jingling.

With a forlorn sigh, Dean sank forward over his knees. His teeth started to chatter again, but he felt so bothered by Sam’s immaturity that he didn’t even feel like vocalising the cold with a vrrr.

Dean wasn’t expecting the warmth of Castiel’s body to wrap around him, stopping the shiver almost immediately. He looked to the side, seeing Castiel’s eyes closed, eyelashes fluttering, cheek nuzzling up against Dean’s arm.

Dean wrapped an arm around Castiel in return, bringing him closer. Castiel smiled, and his feet swung from the castle alongside Dean’s.

“Cas?”

“What?”

“Is... Is it weird if I love you?” Dean asked.

“Probably,” Castiel said. “But I love you too, so that makes it okay. Obviously.”

Dean gave a sigh of relief. “‘Kay. Cool.”

The new house was perfect. Sam got his own room, and Dean and Cas got to share – but they were forced to have two beds, for ‘legal reasons’ or something. But that didn’t stop Cas sneaking under Dean’s covers every night, reading unicorn books together by flashlight. By morning, he’d be back in his own bed, and the adults were none the wiser.

When the weather got colder, they were allowed to have a bonfire in the back yard. Mom taught Cas all about proper fire safety, and checking the wood for hedgehogs. She let him light the fire himself. It was the first time an adult had ever let Castiel burn things. He and Dean and Sam toasted marshmallows late into the night – and yes, Dean put some on a pizza. It wasn’t as tasty as he’d expected.

Castiel still had some Halloween candy left over at Christmas-time. Dean was pretty sure the fact he hadn’t stolen it yet was undeniable, concrete proof of his love.

Mom and Yael gave Dean a small collection of makeup for Christmas. Dean’s first act was to smother Castiel in glitter sparkles, and Castiel wasted no time in transferring the glitter to Dean’s face – by any means necessary. The whole caper made them both unreasonably happy, giggling and chasing each other through the house. The same evening, Dean’s teddy bear was anointed with a pink neck ribbon, courtesy of Castiel. (Dean said, eh, he guessed it looked okay. But he insisted that the teddy bear loved it.)

Dean and Castiel fell asleep that Christmas night, curled together with the bee and the bear between them, all sparkling like little diamonds.

Mom was fully aware that Dean and Cas were suspiciously close, and even after the New Year, Sam continued to repeat the story of what he’d seen (because he was a four-year-old moose-eared jerkface). Mom did believe the story, of course, but she never actually saw any evidence it was true.

She tried a few times to ask Dean and Cas what was going on between them, and once she and Yael sat them down and talked to them about Not Being Old Enough For Certain Things, but none of it could change how Dean and Castiel felt about each other right now. They knew being in love with a friend-brother was weird, and maybe wrong, so they kept it a secret. They only kissed in the dead of night, under the covers.

It wasn’t going to stop anytime soon. Or ever.

Like Sam said once, Kitty had found his Forever Home now. Castiel’s newly-reinvented concept of ‘home’ did not necessarily include the four walls, the superhero bedcovers, the three square meals (and four to five questionably healthy snacks), or even the occasional visits from his mother. However, what it did include – and had always included – was the comfort of knowing there was someone around who cared about him. Someone who loved him. Someone who would be there for him, no matter what.

Nowadays, Castiel’s concept of home mostly described Dean.

Regardless of the challenges and celebrations that would undoubtedly come their way in the future, there was no breaking that bond.

So long as they were together, they were home.