Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural, or Angel. These characters belong to their creators. A/U
A/N: Ok, so I'm not really sure about Cordelia voice, it needs some work and I do need to log some hours watching Angel. I'm also not really sure about Dean, but this just came flowing out and I went with it. I figure Dean on the edge of hell, all messed up with burgeoning feelings and Cordelia will probably be a little less angry and a little more emo.
Ashes & Wine (part one)
He finds happiness thirty-two days before he's going to be dragged into the pit of hell. Her name is Cordelia Chase and he wakes up to find her glowing in his motel room off of the interstate in, god knows where, Delaware. He likes the look of her but douses her with holy water and points his sawed off at her heart because he's learned that evil often comes in pretty little packages.
She stops glowing, but lights up a different way when she starts to laugh, and it sounds like a song Dean's heard a hundred times. It's bitter and a little lonely and when she smiles it's just a slight slant on a pretty face. He can't really remember the whole exchange but it starts with, "You can put the gun down Winchester; I'm here to save your life."
With hell on his heels Dean doesn't really have time to waste. There are words that will be left unsaid, and knots still tied and he's almost scared that he'll be dragging people down with him, but when he meets her gaze its like looking in a mirror. He doesn't know it then but it's the beginning of everything even though it's right before the end.
-----
Six days later Dean's out of immediate danger but Cordelia decides she's going to stay. He's bat shit crazy, fighting vampires with broad swords and running from hell hounds but she figures she might just belong here.
Dean is a puzzle that will never really be put back together, but she likes the way he looks when he smiles and she's always liked a challenge. If anyone is an expert on broken and angry men it's her. Six years of dealing with Angel have left her proficient at stony silences, and good looking men with shoulder's not quite broad enough to carry all the shit they keep piling on.
She doesn't stroke his ego or tell him it's all going to be okay because she figures that hell is a pretty terrible place but at least she can offer him some comfort. Sam seems to like her, and she figures that they are different sides of the same coin. Both with visions, and headaches, living lives they aren't sure they really want but don't trust anyone else with the job.
When Dean puts a cross bow in her hands and tosses her his keys she figures that she's made some sort of right decision. When he yells at her to get her fine ass in gear and throws a charming grin back at her as he follow Sam through muddy, haunted farm land she can't help but think that someone has to be here to watch his back.
Plus it's a pretty good view.
-----
It's been nineteen days since Cordelia wormed her way into his life when he kisses her. Its pouring rain and they are both drenched but when their lips meet he only tastes sunshine and the promise of something wonderful. Dean likes first kisses, has been chasing them his entire life.
But something about the way Cordelia grabs his shirt and pulls him closer, darting her tongue between his lips has him thinking that this might just get better, that this is just the start of something. He's felt loved before, felt it pulse unconditionally around Sam, seen the way it looked sketched on Bobby's forehead, and heard it in every single word his father ever said.
With Cordelia it was all potential, a little slice of something he never even knew he wanted. They spend a rainy afternoon in the motel stripping each other of wet clothes and placing hasty kisses on wounds long since healed. When they tumble into each other a third time and he looks up to meet her eyes he begins to realize that she is going to become another set of goodbyes.
He's running out of time and when the clock strikes twelve – she kisses his forehead and mumbles thirteen.
-----
She stops counting in days. Its precious hours, and stolen minutes and when she looks at him sometimes she can see him fading right there before her eyes.
189.
It's late, or early depending on your point of view, and she barely sleeps now. Her visions barreling into her, one after the other, and she's supposed to run. The powers want her out of here, but she's watching Dean struggling to breathe, nightmares making it more and more difficult for him to act like its all okay and she's silently telling them to forget about it.
She wants to throw punches, break dishes and scream 'screw yourself' to the powers at be, because everything about this scenario is fucked. She doesn't want to watch the life drain out of another brother in arms, and she's learned enough about Dean Winchester over the past few weeks to know that he doesn't deserve the pit.
188.
He buries it the best he can – tries to hide the fear, and the gentle kindness that lives right beneath his surface. She's spent the past six years getting closer and closer the fire, and when she touches Dean she's sure that she's going to go down in flames.
He shifts and mumbles her name and she lays back down burying her head into his chest, making sure she can hear his heart beat. She finds sleep around hour 185, just when he's waking up to catch the sunrise with Sam.
-----
He can almost feel the demons at his back when he opens and shuts the door to the motel room. Cordelia's spread out on the queen size mattress with an arm haphazardly hanging from the edge. It's a picture he wouldn't mind seeing everyday for the rest of his life, he probably will, he thinks ironically. Her long, tanned limbs, entwined with sheets and the steady sound of her breathing reminds him of all the things he will never have. There will never be a woman who promises him forever, and a son eager to learn how to shoot a gun, and a daughter with her mother's eyes and his smirk who likes pie and the sound of her own voice.
He spent eleven months running away from this and towards it and now he's running seriously short on tomorrows. He's not that scared about what waits for him in the pit; it's what waits for the people he left behind. He tries to picture Sam alone, fighting demons and burning bones and its like parts of his heart are being ripped out of his chest.
The thought of Bobby standing by a headstone, watching another person he loves fade away is enough to make him regret his deal with the crossroads' demon. He can't think about Cordelia, about her kissing another man, or letting someone else hear those noises she makes when he touches her in the right spot. He's got a week left, he figures it'll be perfect if he can spend it all drinking beers with Sammy at sunrise, and making Cordelia says his name as the sun goes down.
But people like Dean don't get endings like that, so instead he'll stick his sawed off in the back of his pants, fill his flask up with holy water and go down swinging.