Dean stood up and ran his hand across his hair. Cas wasn't going to answer, of course not. It had been weeks. Rubbing the heels of his hands into his eyes, he fell back onto his bed and tried to sleep. Sam was at the library still; it was a university library and so it was open late.
A quarter of an hour later, Dean had given up on sleep. Given up on Cas. Given up on most things to be honest. He sat on the edge of the bed and leant his head into his hands. He'd finished the bottle of whiskey earlier, and he had no more alcohol left, and just couldn't be bothered to walk down to the bar or the store to get any. But he needed something.
He glanced around the room to see if there was anything to be had, but all there was there was a crucifix, holy water, a bag of salt and a silver knife.
Knife. Perfect.
It had been years, and he had sworn to himself that never again would he stoop to this level of self-hatred, but he just couldn't deal with everything right now. He took the knife in his left hand and rolled up his sleeves. He pressed the knife to the skin of his forearm, noticing how faint the old scars were. Taking a deep breath, Dean pressed the point down and dragged the blade across the side of his wrist. It wasn't deep enough. Again. He kept cutting until there were 8 cuts, about two inches long, not too deep, not too wide, horizontally across the side of his arm and wrist. Damn he'd not really thought about the blood. He cursed under his breath and sought out a few tissues, cleaned the knife, and pressed them against the wounds, waiting for the blood to lessen.
Damn, he'd have to search out his old bracelets too now. He should have thought this through. Stupid. As usual, thinking about the wrong things, missing details, failing to protect Sammy, losing Cas. As soon as the bleeding had almost stopped, he located his old bands and bracelets at the bottom of his rucksack and slipped them over his hand, wincing at the contact of wood and string on open cuts. Sorted. He pulled the sleeve back down and placed the knife back on the table just as Sam opened the door.