Cautiously he settled on the faded leather of the sofa; his black suit crumpled, beer in hand and face stained with sparkling tear tracks. He didn't want to believe it. He wanted to wake up from this terrible nightmare. He refused to acknowledge that he, Dean Winchester, had just buried the love of his life.
Dean choked back a sob as he took a swig of alcohol and closed his eyes as it burned his throat. Castiel Novak had been the best man he had ever met (probably would ever meet). He has – had shiny, chocolate brown hair, an extraordinary ability to not understand yet still be amazingly clever, and bright blue eyes. Dean was still amazed by Cas' eyes; and their capacity to be both the light morning sky and the dark depths of the ocean all at once. His eyes were the clearest, most pure and innocent shade of blue, however they had seen things, like Dean's own, that they could never un-see. They wouldn't have to now.
Sam (Dean's brother) had attempted to talk to him before the funeral this morning. He had told Dean to 'try to let go'. This had not ended well.
"What, you think I haven't?" Dean had almost screamed incredulously. "Do you think I like being like this? Feeling like I want to rip apart my whole house just for reminding me of him! Knowing that I'll never see him again! Not being able to do stupid, mundane tasks without wanting to break down and cry!"
He thinks he started sobbing into Sam's expensive lawyer suit then; with Sam mumbling 'I miss him too's and 'I know's into Dean's soft, dirty blond hair. But Sam didn't know; didn't know what it was like to have to go home every day to the vibrantly coloured walls of the sleek, modern kitchen that they chose together; or the soft, silky sheets on the bed where they'd first said those three little words; or the twisted black iron rails of the balcony that held pots of now wilted flowers that Cas had tended to with such care every morning and evening and overlooked the lazy, quiet, suburban street with all its identical, picket-fenced houses which they had both so craved after returning from war-torn Iraq.
That's how they met; Dean's Marine troop had been captured and was being held behind enemy lines. For months they were tortured for information they didn't have, in ways so horrific that even the most invulnerable, hardened men were screaming and writhing in pain. Electrified rods prodded and probed and burning flames licked at their weather-toughened skin; until there was less screaming and the foul scent of burning flesh - which had invaded Dean's nostrils for so long - lessening slightly; and he knew that another of his allies – his friends - had been lost. Then, at the end of each long, painful day, a man with sunken eyes and cropped grey hair would approach the caged area where Dean had been shackled to the cold stone wall by rusted iron chains and smile cruelly at him;
"You know what you have to do," he would tease in a sing-song voice "you only have to say a few little words and we'll let you go"
And every day Dean would say no; for what felt like years he refused to give up. Until the wonderful day – his day of salvation – when his blue-eyed angel crashed through the door, broke apart the rusty chains and held Dean while he wept in relief.
When he wept again, his angel was no longer there to hold him in warm, forgiving arms and he felt, for the first time, that he was truly broken.