Rolling dunes, a finger-painted sky that glows as the sun sets. The soft lapping of a lake fed into an ocean a stone's-throw away, a cottage near its shore. It's picture-book perfect, but the glazed eyes that flicker past it all remain unimpressed. Castiel sits in his car, the motor still grunting, having only just been shut off, and stares at the small house before him.
I want to leave you with something. I want to give you an anchor.
The man shakes his head, lip curling up at the thought, the voice of the dead that curls through his mind in the toast-dry tones of his lawyer as he read the last wishes of a relative who'd only bothered with Castiel after his death. His grip on the steering wheel tightens before he lets go entirely, slinging the duffel bag from the passenger seat over his arm as he gets out of the car, legs stiff. The air is heavy with salt, wet with humidity. It settles over him, reaching past his collar to stroke its fingers over his throat, down his shoulders to moisten the skin there so his shirt sticks, plastered to his lower back and chest.
The glass-surface lake is a calming shush-shush that flows with the beat of his too-calm heart, a muscle eased by the miracle bonds of chemicals he'd swallowed down at a rest stop an hour or so ago; lithium, Vicodin. They make it easier. And yet the placidity of the water sends a hot-slick bolt of anger through him, sliding like a snake along the puzzle-piece notches of his spine. His fingers reach for the ground and he comes back with a handful of rocks, jagged, smooth, sand a buffer between the contrasting surfaces. The peace of the water is broken and his lips curve up, a mirthless little smirk that twists already angular features, a sharp jaw and nose, generous lips thinning, bloodless as they're pressed together. Empty-handed, he turns toward the house.
The lock grants access easily, though the hinges creak a bit. The air inside is stale; it's been at least a week, if not more, since the grounds have been touched, neatened so nature's wild streak doesn't worm its way past the gates of civilization. The inside is like any other coastal vacation home, light colors and high ceilings, an openness that's meant to instill vacation, maybe. Escape. The windows are large and the watery-tipped fingers of dusk are straggling through, intense pools of dying light gathering on the counter and floor. His keys are left on the table, sprawled across a letter with his name, in neat, block handwriting. His bag is dropped into an over-stuffed armchair facing a television as old as he is, probably.
The house is neat. Everything is in its predictable right place, cups and plates and bowls in the cupboards above the stove, lines in a closet near the small bathroom. It's evidence of nothing, a home that isn't, a glorified hotel. But there's no phone and no disruption, neighbors stopping by for stifling chit-chat, concerned looks that trail him everywhere he goes, people staring like he's blind, like he can't look right back and glean the pity shining in the star-scattering of their irises. So he tours the little cottage, acquaints himself with it and ends up back in the living room, where the contents of his bag wait for him. He pulls a bottle of Jack Daniels, the first of three he brought, and a small bag that carries something he hasn't done in years. It's fresh, a faintly musky smell that sticks to his fingers as he picks it apart and rolls it in the thin paper he'd bought at a truck stop on the way up. The teenager had smirked at him.
Doesn't matter now. He raises the slightly lumpy joint to his mouth and lights it, breathing in the heady smoke wastes no time in its conquest of his mind. It eases in, helped by the first swig of whiskey that burns hot in his throat. The fire is a promise of misery and retching tomorrow, but the effects will be sweet enough tonight. He stands, shucking off his light jacket with the blunt between his teeth. He sucks in too long and fights the urge to cough, lungs fighting to be rid of the sticky smoke. It catches on his shirtsleeves, but a few insistent wrenches and the jacket is abandoned, crumpling onto the couch in a forgotten ball. His hand grasps the cool metal of the door when the letter on the end table catches his attention again, a glance down that leaves him curious. Wondering. It's thick between his fingers, like old-time parchment paper. He steps outside, into cooling air that doesn't feel so much like a slow drown anymore, and sits on a painted-white bench he hadn't noticed before. It creaks, but holds him well enough. Another mouthful of whiskey, another wince at the taste and it's time to read the letter. The last drag of weed curls from his mouth, arching this way and that as it disperses into the night sky; he slits the seal of the envelope with his index finger and squints at the words, trying to bring them into focus.
Castiel.
I know you don't really know me. I know you probably don't want to. You wouldn't have understood the reasons, and I can't even tell you now, really. You'll know why soon enough. But know that I thought only of your safety, that our distance was never something I wanted. After your father died, I—I should have been there. But I was too afraid to leave, too afraid something would happen. And I can't let it. But I've watched you, Castiel. I know the man you've grown into. And I trust you with a task, a secret no one should be responsible for. You will be an unsung hero, Castiel. For that I apologize. But it has to be done. So I'll leave you with a warning: be very, very careful. Do not relax here, and do not go in the lake.
Stay safe, Castiel.
David Novak
A chill skitters up Castiel's spine, cutting through his world gone soft and hazy. He looks up from the paper that's now shaking, the pulse in his fingers sped up, fueled by adrenaline. Unease is thick in his blood, and he can't help but wonder if the night is staring back into him. Just the letter, he assures himself. Just a recluse uncle fucking with you. Relax.
If he goes back inside hastily, there's no one there to judge him. Just a faint splash he doesn't hear over the pound of his heart in his ears, a fear he pins on the weed he hasn't smoked in years. He can laugh at himself when he's back inside, when the safety of walls are around him, doing their job, protecting him from the long-legged beasties of his nightmares. The ones he's had more of lately. The ones in slow motion he can't tear his eyes away from. The ones where—
No. Not going there.
Distraction. Distraction is what he needs and the shelf behind his uncle's television is full of them. Comedy, romance, action. He chooses a movie at random and puts it in the dvd player, technology at odds with the rest of the place, a relic belonging more to the fifties than the twenty-first century. He sags back into the velvet of the couch, bringing the bottle of Jack up for another swallow, one that doesn't taste like anything anymore. It slides him away, fanning him out like dust blowing in the wind so he isn't thinking about anything, not the ominous note, not the light fading from eyes, closing slowly, even as he begged them not to.
He slips into dreams and the movie continues, bathing him in the pale reflection of the tv's glow, the idle chatter and witty lines white noise against his dead-to-the-world ears. A press of lips on his forehead and he forgets the isolated house he's inherited, forgets the new lines in his forehead and slips away into the nothing embrace of a man that whispers his name soft as steam rising from a morning cup of coffee. Castiel.
Fingers on his cheeks, a bumpy path halted by the overgrowth of stubble dotting the skin there and on his jaw. Spirals and slinking lines are drawn into his skin, moving down his neck to a suddenly bare chest where nails scratch just right, one foot on dry-throated pleasure, the other resting on red-tipped pain. Castiel throws his head back, mouth open, gasping at the tide of ecstasy he's lost in. The drag of a mouth over his abdomen, down his sides catches his cells, lighting them like fireworks to rain sparks down. The colors burst behind his eyes and the sensations expand until he can't tell where he starts and his love stops. If there's a separation at all.
Only, he knows there is. He knows if he opens his eyes and stares into the amber waiting for him, the long lashes that girls were always jealous of (the fine hair he ran his pinky through while the other was sleeping) that this will end and he will wake and find himself alone again.
"It's been over a year," he hears, a frown pressed to his hip before pulling back to let teeth mark a half-moon there. "You don't have to be alone."
"Finn."
"I know." A kiss to quiet him, mouths entwining, opening like a flower drenched in the morning's dew. They move honey slow, patient and comfortable in the knowledge of one another's bodies. Castiel's hands come to life and he crushes Finn to him, but the echo between their chests is that of his own heart, the muscle that determines him to be alive, the same flesh that deems his love dead. Finn's hips jerk up, trapping the heat of his sex so it fills and he tenses, laying his head on the other man's shoulder. They stutter out a pattern, hitching and pressing until the pulsing rise of completion ripples in him and he can't help but draw the heavy curtain of his eyelids back. Amber, too bright, looks back and he's hanging in the stars, drunk with the beauty he knows he won't ever get to see again.
Finn smiles.
Castiel opens his eyes for real to find the bleak crack of dawn staring back at him. He's still half drunk, reeling with nausea and the too-real touch of a man who is long gone. The smell of semen jolts his already careening stomach and he stumbles to the bathroom, thankful he can even remember the location. His wretches are liquid at best; the last thing he ate he can't remember and it isn't coming up now. Minutes pass and his head remains in the bowl, salty shame and anger leaking from his eyes, splashing silently into the cold water too close to his face for comfort. He breathes a little easier after that, gets up and pulls his pants and boxers off, grimacing at the hardening residue left behind. When he climbs into a bed that isn't his in a town he barely knows and drops off into fitful sleep, at the back of his mind he can't help but wonder if it would be better if he didn't wake up at all.
Listless sleep rolls its covers back around noon. Castiel treks red-eyed into the shower and turns it up as hot as it will go, pale skin pink and stinging when he gets out, the blood at the surface, his body one pulse that beats hardest in his head. He needs coffee. And something solid so the coiled ball of his stomach can unfurl, if just a little bit. His duffle is where it was last night, the television still on, the main menu of the dvd playing softly over and over again. He pulls out pants and a shirt and hopes they match, dresses looking out the window.
And that's when he sees it. Or, him, really. Because there's someone in the water, and he's looking at Castiel.
The house, he corrects. There's no way anyone could see that far—and the house is shaded. No. The person must just be checking to see if he'll be caught.
He's out the door before he knows what he's doing.
"Hey!" He winces at the volume of his own voice, the fever pitch his headache takes, so much so that he has to bend forward for a moment, trying to keep the bile in his stomach. When he looks up, he calls out again, voice lower.
"Hey," he tries again, his steps a little too fast but he's already got a good momentum.
"What are you doing in—"
He's staring at an empty lake. There's nothing in the water, not even a ripple.
"How did you..." The area is open; no immediate woods or trees—nothing that a person could get to in the time it took Castiel to get from the house to the lake. He cards his fingers through his still-wet hair, the droplets snaking down his wrist, dripping down his neck freely.
"I'm hungover." One step back, two. "I'm really, really hungover and I'm going to get something greasy and disgusting to eat now." The lake doesn't answer when he turns back toward the house, going in only for his keys. He drives away, the warning from the letter loud in his ears.
Don't go in the lake.
The Bay View diner is worn. The booths are a muted red, faded from years of sitting in the sun. The counters wear the mark of years gone by, millions of elbows resting in the same places, subtle grooves that are evident from the corner where Castiel sits, looking at a menu he's seen in countless other roadside restaurants. But the coffe is good and the smell is of sweet pancakes and smoky grease. His mouth waters and he calls the waitress over, a woman who probably talks to everyone like they're her kids, though she doesn't look any older than he. He'd raised his eyebrow at the 'honey,' she'd given him upon entering, but her smile was genuine, though there was something else there, a flicker of emotion too quick for him to catch, even if he cared to.
She brings him coffee with his menu and he reads her name tag. Sharon. After a few minutes of staring blankly at the same spot on the plasticized menu, rubbing at a boiled spot where it had been too close to a burner, or maybe a lighter, she comes back and orders.
"Western omelet, wheat toast, please." His voice is coffee-grinder low, a gravel that sounds like a cigarette bender with a laryngitis chaser. Sharon notices, glancing at the coffee he's added milk to.
"You want some tea with honey instead?"
"I'm alright," he says, and looks up, a wan smile stretching his mouth. She's pretty, dark hair and light eyes, straight features. But what keeps him staring that beat too long is the concern pulling her eyebrows down, the way her eyes tick back and forth between his, looking. Trying to gauge something.
You don't look at a total stranger this way.
He orders an omelet, toast (almost burnt, please,) and more coffee, words a little cold to discourage whatever contact she's trying to initiate, searching his face for a way in, an open window to crawl through.
"I," She comes back to refill his coffee, wipes thin-fingered hands on her apron and twists a lock of dark hair behind her ear. His expression is guarded, a plainy impatient what? pasted to his forehead, but she continues, undeterred. "Are you related to Mr. Novak?"
I am Mr. Novak, he wants to say, though instead a drop of ice falls from his lips in the form of a stiff 'Yes.'
"Oh." She takes a step back, dark eyes widening almost imperceptibly before her facade smooths back over. "Sorry for your loss." And then she's turning on her heel, ponytail curving up with the momentum, narrow back retreating toward the kitchen. His hands attract his attention then, the rough-bitten down cuticles that keep his thoughts away from the burn of his cheeks. She was young. Mid-twenties, maybe.
When his food comes, the ball of embarrassment that sits like a rock in his stomach drops lower. She offers a half-hearted smile and sets down a plate laden with food, far more than the three-egg omelet he'd ordered.
"I'm sorry," he mumbles between lips that have forgotten how to hold polite conversation, the formation of words that aren't barbed with wire and daggers.
"Don't be." But the tense line of her shoulders relax despite herself. She leaves him to eat and he takes a bite, knowing she's still watching. It smells good enough, but the first bite that passes his lips is ash and oil on a rain-slicked road. It's been a year since anything's tasted good, and obviously this meal will be no different. If he stops thinking of it, if he lets his mind drift, the process becomes mechanical and he can almost overlook the bitterness that coats his tongue like a too-warm blanket.
The coffee, though. It hasn't lost his taste and he drinks deep, sighing in contentment at the rich darkness of it, the milk just creamy enough to keep it from bitterness. His fingers trace the rim of the cup when he's emptied it, scooting out of the way when the waitress (Robin, her name tag reads, the pin slightly crooked on her shirt) refills it and he hovers over it a moment, allowing the fragrant steam to rise over his cheeke like the lightest of kisses, lips barely parted.
"Here's your check," Robin whispers, sliding a thin piece of paper across the table. Her nails are bitten-down, red at the cuticle where slivers of old polish remain. He looks down at his plate. His eggs have gone cold.
He stops only once on the way back to the house, at a small grocery store where he buys enough to get him through the next week or so. Time spent in cigarettes and a cloud of thought-obscuring weed residue, whiskey a constant hum at the back of his throat. He won't overdue it again, though, stomach twisting and writhing like a snake inside, a fever pitch of guilt and disgust boiling in his blood, making him want to scrub and tear at his skin until it's clean, until it doesn't feel like he's splitting at the seams. The older man behind the register looks at him a beat too long when he hands over the cash and tells him to take care. Castiel gives a tight smile, the only kind his mouth remembers, and leaves.
Castiel loved to sleep in the sun. His mother would find him outside sometimes, curled up on a blanket, a wash of lemon light resting on his eyelashes, elongating the shadows like neat rows of parallel lines against his cheeks. The drive home is one of honey-dripped drowsiness, a thick and lazy feeling that has him blinking in an effort to keep awake. His window is down and the air is hot, plucking at the hair on his arms, skirting over the beads of sweat that form on the back of his neck.
The house looms, finally, and he's distracted, thinks only of delving into cool sheets and letting the afternoon slip by. The groceries are heavy, but taking two trips is out of the question, so his arms are loaded as he turns to go into the house, kicking the car door shut as he eases of of it backwards.
"Hey!"
He drops the groceries at the sound of a voice from behind. It's abrupt, a bell tolling on the quietest of days and just as clear, melodious in a way he notices for a split second, though his attention is quickly called to the gallon of milk that all but explodes as it hits the ground, splattering his pants and shoes. And then, before he can look up, the world explodes into a starburst constellation of white-hot pain, colors flashing in front of his eyes. He sinks to his knees, a sudden thud he doesn't feel, before the thread of consciousness unravels completely and he's cast away, the world black around him.