So, this little fic was inspired by the song Stare by Marjorie Fair, which is just one of the most utterly Destiel songs ever. Seriously, LISTEN TO THE LYRICS. Angst a plenty. Dean, get over the self-hatred.

These are things I feel but don't want to say

In case you feel that way

These are things I know but don't want to say

In case you feel that way

I'll wait another day-Marjorie Fair

And then Cas says What's wrong, Dean? even as Dean tries to keep his eyes on the road because it's a conversation that never ends even if they aren't talking.

He opens his mouth and the words are ready to spill out: Your freaking eyes, the way you can't stop staring, the way you've never heard of personal space, dude, even when we talk about it a million times, the way you-you. You.

Dean knows it's there, just beyond his reach, and that if he opened his mouth and let the words spill out into Cas's blue eyes, it would shatter in the air between them, this thing that's always there but never spoken, and it would be hearts shaking and breath trembling and desperate waiting for an answer, and Dean doesn't know if it would be awesome or terrible or maybe both at the same time.

But there's always another day.

There's always another day. It's when Cas is sitting next to him in a diner or is watching Dean order drinks at a bar or it's when Cas has just popped into the passenger seat and is laughing at something that Dean said, some random off-handed comment that probably wouldn't seem that funny to Sammy who's been stuck with Dean his whole life but that Cas seems to find absolutely gut-bustingly hilarious sometimes, even when Dean himself wonders what the hell Castiel finds so enthralling in his company.

(Yeah, enthralling, he says mentally when Sammy's voice echoes in his head asking if he really just used an SAT word. He knows words. Deal with it.)

But Cas's words are what he clings onto, doesn't realise how hard until the moments when Cas disappears and Dean's only got the words to hold onto and sometimes they're what turn over and over in his head, making patterns out of Cas's stories and Dean always wants Cas's voice to last a little longer.

Sometimes, he looks over at Cas in the car and wants to tell him to stay. To ask him to tell him more, a story about the stars, a story about the world, a story about anything. To ask him, to just keep talking for another minute. At the bar, to buy him another drink, ask him to just hang out for a while. At the diner, to ask Cas to just drive somewhere, anywhere with him just for a few minutes more.

But if he ever opens his mouth, the words die in his throat and even as Cas pauses, waiting for the question that's never asked, and after their eyes hold for that one taut second, Dean lets his flicker away, even as his thoughts let out a dull roar in revolt.

He never hears the next of Cas's sentences.

Whenever he wakes up and finds Cas standing there, watching him, he makes a show of hating the whole thing but that's because he doesn't want to admit that that's become one of the few things he's got to cling onto.

It's kind of comforting waking up to see an angel standing by your bed, not that Dean would ever admit that.

And sometimes, Castiel will sit and talk, with that trenchcoat he's always got around his shoulders, and that gravel voice that seems to live in Dean's ears and those stupid too big, too blue eyes that Dean wants to hold onto and at the same time scream at to get away.

He knows he should tell Cas to leave but when those too-big, too-blue eyes are on his, he just listens and watches, even when the talking lasts until the sun comes up and he's still listening to Cas talking about the first time he saw a star being born, a sunburst of light that changed everything.

Dean wants to tell Cas to lie down but instead, he just takes in those eyes and let's Cas look back and says nothing.

Things can go from feeling to knowing before you stop them and Dean figures that that point came a long time ago. He's not blind and he's not stupid and he knows. He knows there's something there that he didn't ask for and didn't want and didn't think Cas wanted but it's there between them, a bone-deep shiver in the air, and maybe it's been there since the first time Castiel walked through that barn door, maybe it's been there since Castiel's hands dragged Dean up and out of hell, back to the Earth, dragged him back to life.

But it's there and Dean knows it and he doesn't know when he started knowing it. But he knows it won't stop.

He watches Cas and Cas watches back and when that gaze lasts way too long, Dean always tells himself he'll be the first to look away.

(He always is but never when he says and never at the right moment.)

But Cas's eyes are what drag Dean's up and Dean's are what pull Cas back whenever he leaves, his eyes searching for Dean's the moment he enters the room and that looseness in his shoulders just for a moment when he sees him, as if he's found what he came for.

(And that can't be him.)

But Dean knows it's there, and even if he can't stop it, he can keep talking, keep walking, keep hunting, rather than let himself feel it.

(And keep his mind shouting over whatever the hell Cas feels.)

But it's there and it's never out loud. And Dean's kept it like that.

And it's not what anyone else would think, or hell, even what Dean himself would think.

(It's not because he's scared Castiel will push him away.)

(It's because he thinks he won't.)

(Knows he won't.)

The hardest part is knowing he could have it. That that conversation, dragged on a little longer, could be the words that change everything, that one touch on the shoulder that lingers could be a hand that travels down the arm. A hand that brushes a wrist. Fingers that brush a palm.

It could all be something if Dean doesn't let it be nothing.

(And he doesn't think he does.)

He doesn't let it be nothing but it could be more.

And that's the hardest part because he could have it. He could reach out. He could grab Cas's arm, ask Cas the question, lean in when Cas is staring, lean in and brush a thumb beneath those big blue eyes. He could do it all, and then he could leap into something new and out of reach and bright and that scares him to death.

Are you sure everything's all right, Dean?

Fine, Dean grinds out and he slams down on the accelerator harder.

(He wouldn't tell anyone.)

(But what he wants more than anything in the world is what he doesn't want.)

Cas could say yes, Dean knows. Cas's mouth could open and the world could turn upside down in the best and scariest and most fantastic way possible.

And then Dean could take another step, kill another demon, make another deal, get another mark. Then, Dean could take another step down and drag Cas with him.

Then, Dean could break whatever they are into pieces because he said it and Cas said it, too.

(Then Dean could break Cas.)

(They're better shivering than broken.)

And so Cas could say yes and so Dean never says it at all. It just hangs there in the air, a current trying to light up a room, trembling with the edge of it all.

The pain just makes me want to stare

At the same things I saw before

Thinking there's something more

God , it's a lonely place

I'll see you soon, Dean says Cas and he never looks up from the steering wheel as Cas nods, leans over and lets his hand grip his shoulder.

(And he knows Cas will be back and that's the worst and best bit of it all.)

I'll see you soon is Cas's voice again and for a second Dean's head snaps up and his eyes and Cas's find each other. There's a long moment of them watching each other, just them watching.

And then he's gone, vanished before Dean could grab his coat sleeve and beg him to stay or wish he could beg him to stay.

But he's gone and Dean should be glad that he's gone. That he's safely out of reach.

(Until the next time.)

Dean drives and the night drives with him, the stars unrolling out beneath the wheels as he stares straight ahead and all he sees are Cas's eyes.

It's good that he's gone. It's good that it's not aloud. It's good that it's not here, now, yet.

(Even if it is.)

But Dean would give anything for Cas to still be next to him right now.

(And he knows that's the truth, even when he's begging Cas to vanish, to go, to realise, to realise how much good he could get somewhere else.)

Dean would give anything but right now, he hangs on to what's never been spoken.

(Even if the seat next to him's too empty.)

Dean drives on with his eyes on the road ahead and that's what matters.

(Not the aching in his ribs and the blood on his tongue from biting it with words that hurt more than teeth when they're trapped inside.)

Dean keeps driving with his mouth sour with secrets they both know and his ribs hollow with the aching emptiness of what he could have.

Say the same things you said before

Wanting you even more

God, it's a lonely place

DEAR GOD, DEAN, GET OVER THE SELF-HATE AND KISS HIM. Leave a review, if you liked it. :)