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Before dealing with Dean and his brother, Castiel had been baffled by the humans’ tendency to lie their way to whatever they want or need. Five years later, he has learned to lie and bend the truth – for the greater good, he thought at the time; he has been forced to lie – to Dean, by Naomi – and he has been lied to – by Metatron. Every time, no matter how good his intentions, the mess just got bigger.
And if indeed truth hurts, as the saying goes, Castiel has learned that lies are no less painful. Indeed, pain seems to be a constant element of being human; it is not only physical pain that torments humans, because the things that hurt the most are often fear, doubt, disappointment, uncertainty.
And then there’s love. A long time ago Castiel thought he knew all about it, just like he thought he knew all about truth and lies. Well, he knew what angels were “programmed” to know, at least. Now he just knows that he doesn’t understand how love is actually supposed to work. Is it supposed to be so frustrating? So unsettling? So painful?
For humans – and he is totally, helplessly human now – everything seems to be so very complex. New sensations and feelings assail him and it is nearly as painful as the fall itself. Cold bites, hunger twists his insides, heat makes him sticky, thirst burns his throat. And it takes so little to hurt him severely; even a small scratch takes days to heal completely.
The body has a mind of its own, it demands attention; it gets tired and craves sleep, nourishment and a great deal of care. His body – now that is really and completely his – feels heavier, more clumsy but also much more connected to everything else around him. It is puzzling, awe-inspiring and scary. This fragile body is teaching him new things. It makes him feel a lot of things, new things, all at the same time and he feels like he could burst and he doesn’t know how human beings stand it.
But that’s exactly the point. Human beings are born for this. They have been created for this. It’s exactly what was meant for them. But angels weren’t meant for this; for the doubt of making decisions, the joy of tasty food, the prospect of growing old – a luxury for people who are not in the hunting business, clearly – the intoxicating smell of lust and the ache of love.
And he knows that love is supposed to be good and high and right. Still, it creates lots of misunderstandings and often leads people to make the wrong choices. Oh, he knows all about that. Furthermore, it either makes people lie all the time or utter some very uncomfortable truths.
Cas knows there are things he shouldn’t say out loud, especially when Dean is around, because Dean himself has featured in some of his dreams lately, doing some very graphic and inappropriate things – which Cas enjoyed immensely. And every time Cas thinks about those dreams, he feels a lot of conflicting emotions that make him very confused and frustrated. Again, he doesn’t know how humans stand all this, this weird mix of emotions and physicality.
Those dreams are frequent and hard to ignore… and then the dreams are not the only things that are hard to ignore. Even though Cas has learned how to take care of that ”little” problem, he doesn’t know how to deal with the bigger problem, namely his feelings for Dean.
He just can’t tell Dean the truth. That much he knows. He has already messed up on a cosmic scale too many times, he doesn’t need another reason to make Dean angry and disappointed, again.
These thoughts are troubling him, and if there is one thing he has learned from Dean is that moments like these call for a drink – or rather, many drinks.
And Cas starts the night downing glass after glass of cheap wine. It’s red and kinda sour and rough in his throat and it doesn’t really help much because it fills his head with all sorts of inappropriate thoughts. He hasn’t been human long, but he knows that the vivid scenes popping up in his mind are the pizzaman’s kind of stuff. He remembers that, and he remembers how innocent he was back then. It seems like a hundred years have passed since then, even though it’s probably only five years, which is not even a second in the life of an angel. But he isn’t an angel anymore…
When he was an angel he could basically drink a whole liquor store and just be a bit tipsy. Now his tolerance for alcohol is a lot lower. But that’s the point. People drink to get inebriated, so that they can forget their problems for a while. But it’s really hard to forget about a problem if said problem is in the same room, looking insufferably…delectable.
“Trying to drown your sorrows in a bottle again?” Dean asks.
Cas has just finished the bottle of red wine and he’s contemplating moving on to tougher stuff, so he scoffs “Look who’s talking…”
Dean stares at him, his eyes hard, and Cas wonders why that has to make him look so damn attractive. He doesn’t know if it’s the alcohol or the five years of pent-up tension between them, but he suddenly feels he’s going to do something stupid.
Something like telling Dean the truth.
It’s like being possessed, he hears himself talking but it feels like he can’t stop, like it’s someone else talking, telling Dean exactly how many times he has dreamt of him, and what the Dean of his dreams was doing to him, and how much he liked that, and how much he craves Dean’s touch and his love. He goes on and on, not sparing any intimate – shameless, actually – detail and his voice sounds rough and filthy to his own ears. Surely Dean will punch him in the face and throw him out of the bunker, because his eyes are dark and his stillness must only mean that he’s furious.
But after that, it is all a hazy blur of hands and lips and the bitter taste of alcohol that brought them finally to a turning point. And as Dean drags him towards his room, Cas thinks that maybe truth doesn’t hurt so much in the end.