Castiel is sitting in his favorite Heaven, in the eternal Tuesday afternoon of an autistic man. His smooth, black wings, which he is only allowed to show when in Heaven, are wrapped tightly around his body.
He is waiting. Waiting for the voice he has been hearing over the last four years, each and every night.
"Angels are watching over you." The voice murmurs softly, every evening. But he doesn't only hear the words that come out of Mary Winchesters mouth. He also hears her silent prayer, her hope for the words to be true. And he makes them become true.
Every time he hears her, he descends from Heaven and he stands silently next to little Dean Winchester's bed.
Castiel's mere presence seems to help Dean fall asleep, and Castiel stays there all night, invisible, until he watches his protégé wake up the next morning. Only then he leaves, sometimes not even then. Sometimes he stays the whole day in the little house in Kansas and observes the Winchesters, observes Dean.
He has been there from the very first night, when Dean was only a few hours old and Mary had pronounced those words for the first time.
"Angels are watching over you." She had said, and Castiel had heard her prayer.
"Please protect him." She had thought, and Castiel had done so.
He had watched Dean cry in the hospital bed next to his parents, and when Dean had finally fallen asleep and Mary and John had too, he had suddenly felt the urge to hold his hand. Though asleep, Dean had still seemed to notice the caress on his palm and had tightly gripped Castiel's thumb.
The angel does not understand. Why do angels have to watch over Dean? Why does Dean need protection? Why would someone want to hurt something as innocent as this little human being?
Castiel doesn't understand a lot about humans, but he has been there every night, for four years, so now he understands quite a few things about Dean.
He understands that John Winchester's Impala is fascinating, though he doesn't understand why. He understands that pie is delicious, though he has never tried one. And he understands that Dean's toy soldiers are important, and that if five-month-old Sammy, who has just started to crawl, picks up one of them and either smashes it on the floor or starts eating it (why he does that, Castiel does not understand) Dean starts to shout at Sam.
When Dean gets angry at him, Sam usually just looks at his older brother with his big, sad eyes while saliva is finding its way from Sammy's mouth to the floor. Castiel assumes that this is some type of self-preservation mechanism that human babies have, and apparently it works because either the eyes or the saliva (more likely the eyes) calm Dean down.
Castiel would think that Dean's toys were more important to him than Sam, but then again, a few weeks ago, he has witnessed a scene which has made him change his opinion.
Sam had fallen down the stairs while holding one of the toy soldiers in his hand. It broke into pieces. But Dean didn't care. He ran to his baby brother, who was bleeding from a small wound on his forehead, and started to talk to him, asking if he was ok. As an answer, Sam only cried. Maybe that was baby-language to say that he wasn't ok, Castiel isn't sure. The two boys had been alone in their house, their father at work and Mary gone, just for a moment, to talk to their neighbour.
When Mary came back Sam was already sitting in his highchair in the kitchen, a huge patch on his forehead. Dean was trying to make his brother eat ice-cream, saying that it helped against anything. Sammy seemed to prefer to smear it over his body and over the kitchen table; he even dared to splash his little hand full of chocolate ice right onto Dean's face, leaving a mark there. Dean was so surprised that he couldn't fight back in time, but he didn't really mind after he heard Sam giggling.
The toy soldier was forgotten.
Castiel had thought about it again, and then decided that if not even a toy soldier was more important than Sammy, then probably nothing was.
Those moments had been nice, some of them Castiel considered precious. But there was one, more important to him than any other.
And this moment repeated itself every night. It was the moment in which Castiel watched little Dean finally closing his eyes, knowing that he would not open them until next morning.
So why not today? Why hadn't Mary called him?
It is an unusual thing for an angel to get impatient. After all, they live for centuries. A whole month sometimes just feels like a few seconds. But in this case it doesn't.
Castiel knows that on Earth it is already long past midnight.
He slowly stands up. Angels aren't supposed to go to Earth if no one has called them or if no other angel has ordered them to go, but they also aren't exactly forbidden to do so.
He isn't really good at making decisions on his own, but this time he only thinks about it for a few seconds until he closes his eyes and concentrates.
An instant later he is standing next to Dean Winchester, inside his human vessel but invisible, as always. But he has no idea where he is. They aren't in the little house in Kansas, that he is sure of.
The lights in the room he is standing in are turned off, but the curtains are open, letting in just enough moonlight to distinguish the silhouette of a little boy sitting alone and motionless on a small bed. Looking so forlorn.
Castiel slowly approaches the bed, his eyes not leaving for one second the face of the little boy he is supposed to protect. He suddenly stiffens when he realized that there are tears on Dean's face. He lifts his hand wanting to wipe them away, but he stops, mere centimetres from the boy's face and lets the hand sink again. Whatever it is, he cannot help Dean.
And even if he could, he is not supposed to.
He really isn't supposed to.
And Castiel never does something he is not supposed to.
But there is always a first time and the reason for the first time that Castiel does something he shouldn't is called Dean Winchester.
"Dean?" he asks, unsure of what to do, and when the boy looks around confusedly, Castiel makes himself visible.
For two very long seconds, Dean stares at the intruder then he jumps off his bed, puts a hand under his pillow, and pulls out a knife. He holds it protectively in front of his body and then glances at the door out of the corner of his eyes, as if trying to plan his escape route.
Castiel tilts his head.
"Dean, where did that knife come from?" he asks
"Dad gave it to me" answers Dean, and then bites his lip as if trying to remind himself that he shouldn't talk to strangers.
"Why would he do that?" Castiel continues asking.
"That's none of your business" Dean sticks out his chin trying to make himself look taller, but his voice is trembling.
"Dean, my name is Castiel. I am an angel of the Lord and I am here to protect you."
"There is no such thing as angels" says Dean firmly, and Castiel is surprised at the coldness in his voice.
"Put the knife down." He says in a soothing voice "I am not going to hurt you. Your mother sent me, Dean."
Dean's eyes widen. Then his grip on the knife tightens even more.
"You're lying" he says, but he doesn't seem very convinced. He lets the knife sink a bit, but doesn't put it away just yet.
"My mother" he asks. "Where is she? Is she with you? Can you bring me to her?"
"Dean, I am afraid I do not know where your mother is right now. Why don't you know?"
Dean lets go of the knife, dropping it onto his pillow. He leans back and pulls his legs onto the bed, embracing them with his arms. His face is hidden behind his knees, the perfect position for someone trying to make himself small, to disappear if possible.
But the only one in Dean's room with the ability to disappear has no intention of doing so.
This time Castiel doesn't hesitate before lifting Dean's head by putting a hand under his chin and wiping his tears away. It is Castiel's first physical contact with a human being since… well, since little Dean Winchester had gripped his thumb, when he was only one day old, in that hospital bed. It feels like ages ago.
There is no reason for Castiel to feel as if he owes Dean, but still the only thing he wants to do is give back some of the security that Dean gave him that first time they met.
"Why are you crying?" the angel asks. And his voice is not pitying, not compassionate, it is simply confused. 'Why would you cry, Dean?' Is his silent question 'How could someone dare hurting you?'
The boy's answer is as plain as Castiel's question.
"Our house burnt down." Dean explains, and Castiel tries to understand.
"I am so sorry, Dean." He says, though he doesn't really know what for. Could a building really mean so much to him? Castiel had been thinking that he was starting to understand humans, but apparently he didn't. "Don't you worry, Dean, you will find another house, a better one…"
"My mother was inside the house" Dean interrupts him and Castiel goes silent. "Don't tell me I will find another one, a better one." It is surprising how much bitterness a four-year-old can put into his voice
"You will not" Castiel says softly. Never in his whole life has he felt so incongruous. He doesn't know what he is supposed to do with his hands, what does he usually do with them? Should he be standing or sitting down? What is the correct thing to say? After all, he still is an angel and one of the first lessons he has had to learn is that –unlike the general assumption- the most important thing isn't being good. It is being correct.
He ends up sitting down next to Dean, not saying a word, even though there are so many questions to be asked.
When Dean leans his head on Castiel's shoulder, he is so careful that at first the angel doesn't even notice. Hesitantly, Castiel puts his arm around Dean's shoulders, a gesture that he has seen humans use a million times, and never understood. Now he does. He also never understood when people said that silence speaks louder than words. Now he does.
It is Dean who breaks the quiet first.
"What was your name again?"
"Castiel"
"I will call you Cas." It is definitely not a question.
"I don't think that is appropriate"
"I don't care."
They fall silent again, the only noise being the monotonous tic-toc of a clock hanging on the wall behind them.
It is a stupid thing to do, but Castiel starts counting the seconds that pass. When he reaches 180, he asks his first question.
"Where is Sam?" Because if Sam is important to Dean, he also is to Castiel.
"He wouldn't fall asleep, so Dad took him for a walk. I wanted to go with them, but he told me to stay."
Silence.
Tic-toc.
180 seconds.
"Where are we?"
"A motel, somewhere near Kansas."
This time only 35 seconds before Castiel can't hold back his next question.
"Why a motel? Why not at some friend's house?"
Dean shrugs his shoulders
"Because Dad said so." He thinks a bit, before adding: "I don't like motels. When I am out of this one I never want to live in one ever again."
Castiel holds the boy just a little bit tighter.
"What will you do next?"
Dean looks up, his eyes meeting Castiel's.
"I don't know."
Once again they fall silent. When Castiel wants to ask about the origin of the fire, Dean is quicker putting his question.
"So angels really exist?"
"You are not supposed to know that."
"But I do know it."
"You are going to have to forget that." Castiel murmurs, more for himself than for Dean, who ignores this last comment.
"Can you fly, Cas?"
"Every angel can."
"Can you take me with you? Take me far, far away?"
The angel looks down thoughtfully, into tearful, desperate, green eyes.
"Would you really want that?"
'Of course' is what Dean is going to say, but his mouth closes again, the image of Sam appearing in his mind. "No"
In that moment they hear a baby crying in the distance, coming closer.
"That's Sammy" says Dean "Dad doesn't understand that taking him out for a walk won't be of any use. Only I can make him fall asleep, and sometimes Mum could."
Castiel closes his eyes. Allows himself one more tic-toc of the clock to sit there and hold Dean, while John and Sammy are approaching the room. Then he stands up, and goes down on his haunches in front of the little boy, sitting on his motel-room-bed.
"Listen to me, Dean Winchester" he says "you have to be strong now, you hear me? You have to promise that you will not give up, that you will continue listening to your father and taking care of your brother."
"Where are you going, Cas?" Dean's voice is so thin that it feels like physical pain for Castiel.
"Not far, I promise."
"How far is not far?"
Castiel doesn't hesitate one second to give Dean the answer that he wants to hear.
"I will be right beside you. I will take care of you. I promised that to your mother and I am promising it now to you."
Now they can also distinguish John's footsteps approaching.
"Will I ever see you again, Cas?"
"That is very unlikely."
"But not impossible?"
"Not impossible"
Dean nods, with the faith of someone who hasn't found out yet that when a person says about something that it is very unlikely, it is only their way of avoiding to say No. But then again, an angel is not a person.
"And now sleep, Dean" The angel says, pressing his middle and his index finger onto Dean's forehead as softly as he can.
"Cas…" whispers Dean, while closing his eyes and slowly sinking back onto the bed, as if desperately trying to hold on to that name.
The next day, Dean Winchester will wake up, not remembering a word of his conversation with an angel. Maybe a faint whiff of the security that he found when leaning on Castiel's shoulder will stay back, but not more. And maybe the next few years he will have a silent, invisible companion, a guardian angel, but he will not get to see him. And maybe Castiel will see Dean grief about his mother and will wish that he could be there for him, but he broke the rules once for Dean Winchester and it is not in his plan to do it again.
But this night, this night Castiel stands next to Dean Winchester's bed and like every night, he stays there until the boy is completely asleep. And as the door of the motel room starts to open, John entering, in his arms little Sammy, Castiel pulls a blanket over Dean's body and disappears, not before giving his promise one last time…
"Angels are watching over you, Dean Winchester"