Its always been simple, really. Not speaking. You don't have to respond, or show that you care. It takes no effort at all, and it gives you less problems in return.
Now, dont get me wrong, I can speak. I just don't choose to speak. Every meaningless word being echoed and thrown like a piece of garbage, it's taken for granted. The words might as we'll be meaningless, since people just say whatever nonsense comes to their minds these days. That's why I don't speak, waste of time, waste of air, and waste of mouth.
But isn't not using your mouth a waste of vocal chords?
Ah, I personally don't know. It's like a privilege, yes, but some people don't get to have that privilege. I would rather be like them then be one of many who take words for granted. In a way, I don't choose to speak, but I guess I speak when it really matters.
But, one of the few first words I uttered were out of joy, pure absolute joy. Serendipity. And this is how it went.
...
"No! Your still not listening! You never listen! It's like every word I say comes out one ear and flys through the other, huh?"
"At least I'm not like you! You have me on a leash! I just want to go out with friends!"
"Out with friends my fucking ass. I don't think you remember what day it is do you? Nor what happens every fucking time you go out...I DO NOT WANT TO FIND ANOTHER HAIR CLIP IN YOUR SHIRT!"
"It's just a hair clip Mina! Don't be so fucking paranoid and let me go!"
"So you don't remember huh?" Mina, my mother, exclaims, the sweet voice surprisingly calm...almost too calm.
"It's just Saturday, Mina, what's the big deal." My Father replies back, and my shoulders fall.
Of course he forgot, he always forgets, but I thought it would be different...
The look of utter exhaustion that flows through Mina's blue eyes is almost heart breaking. She sighs, and puts her hands on the sofa that separates herself and my father. "Fine, go out, don't bother coming back, it's not like you ever remembered his other birthdays before...so why should this be any different?"
Apparently she thought with high hopes too.
"This is unfair. Mina, don't do this..." My father replies back, and walks towards my mother.
Tears start to stream down my mothers face but I resist the urge to run over there and hug her until the tears fall no more. I can't have them know I overheard.
"No! I am sick and tired of your Bull Shit Liam! Castiel can have a happy fucking birthday without you, like he always has, and he now forever will."
"Mina..."
"I SAID GO! GO! Pack your fucking things and leave!" She lashes out, pointing at the staircase which I currently occupy. I get up quickly, my small feet carrying me as much as they can up the staircase, until I see Michael sitting at the top with Lucifer, Gabriel and Anna. My brothers and sister.
"Cassie!" Gabriel reaches a small hand out, which I take and they pull me into their forgiving arms. Where we lay in the hallway, holding eachother tighter as we watch our Father bound up the steep steps with dread.
He catches our group hug with a look of guilt, but pays no mind to us, ignoring us as always. As it has always been, but he'll be gone.
He'll be gone.
The thought drips into my mind like rain, a light litter patter here...building up and up to a pounding of unforgiving water.
But dear god if it's storm that comes pouring down on our desert then let it never end. Because when he's gone Mom will smile again, and Michael won't have to be slapped by him and Anna won't have to go to Fathers office in the middle of the night, Lucifer won't have to nurse my fathers hangovers to days on end anymore! Gabriel will be able to crack jokes, to smile, to laugh, to make everyone else laugh.
Everything will be perfect.
Just like it used to be.
Long after our Father has left we stay silent, listening to our mothers wails and crashes of pictures. To the side of me Anna's tears create a puddle on my shoulder and with my free hand I comb through her ginger hair. I breathe in a breath of air and form the words like silk in my mouth.
"He's gone,...we can smile."
The gasp of surprise that erupts through Anna's mouth is more than audible. I look up at everyone else, seeing their surprise but I don't say anything in reply, the smile that warms on their face is more than enough.
"Thank you, Castiel..." Anna whispers back as she slips both of her arms around my waist in a comforting hug. "Happy Birthday, little brother."
"Yes, happy birthday." Lucifer nods from the other side of me and slips his arm around my shoulder.
Gabriel and Michael say their congrats and slips their arms around me too, which sends my heart to a place of numbness, like a happy buzz.
"We should go and check on mother," Michael states after a while, and I nod in agreement. "She mustn't be in a happy state right now, lets go help her."
We get up, staring at the staircase like its a monster that could swallow us whole in one move. But Michael steps forward, the brave eldest brother showing us that it is okay to stand up and we follow. When we see our mother, she's in the middle of the living room, glass broken around her and her knuckles stained red. Her eyes are puffy, skin blotchy, and the urge to sweep her up into my arms once more fills through my body.
"Lucifer, can you get a wet towel?" Michael asks and Lucifer nods, catching on. "Anna, Gabe, broom and trashcan...Castiel, lets go talk to mother."
Gabriel and Anna run to the kitchen where the cleaning supplies are and I follow Michael to our weeping mother in the middle of the living room. Michael kneels towards her, putting a comforting hand on my mothers back, rubbing in small circles and it almost seems like he's done this before. I kneel in front of my mother as she looks up, our blue eyes crashing into each others for a moment of clarity and what my mother does is so sudden I wonder if she really did it.
She kisses my toes.
I squeak in surprise as her lips touch my feet, like cold water on a hot day, it's almost natural. Michael inhales a breath of surprise and our mother looks back up to me, eyes filled with regret and sorrow. For a second I thought it was because she just kissed my feet, but the thought is shushed away when I soon realize what I have suddenly forgot.
My father has ruined my birthday.
Well, it wasn't ruined. Because he's gone, and now I can have at least a half decent birthday. But, next year the birthdays will be perfect And that's all that matters. I don't care if my father has ruined my 10th birthday for me, or that since I was five he has ruined it for me. I only care that now he's gone, and my family can smile again.
I repeat the words that I uttered to Anna not so long before, but the smile on my face only bigger now. "He's gone,we can smile."
The gasp of surprise is just like Anna's and I realize how similar my mother and Anna are. The only thing I have in common with my mother is my eyes..
"Castiel...how...how can you speak...?" Mina asks, her hands still firm on my toes, as if I'm a dream and in a second I could just fly away if she lets go. The tears have stopped as if they were never there.
I shrug half heartedly, smiling a bit as if to say 'sorry, secrets aren't meant to be shared'.
"I knew you could speak! I just knew it and Liam didn't believe me, he never did but they told me...they told me how great you actually were..." Mina exclaims, a smile only getting bigger and bigger with each word. Anna and Gabriel drop what their doing and run over to us, Lucifer in tow with the damp towel slung over his forearm.
"Mom...what are you talking about?" Gabriel asks, and kneels over her.
"Castiel is an angel."
Michael snorts to say the least in my direction but doesn't break contact with our mother. "Mom, are you sure your okay?"
"She's right you know..." Anna whispers over my shoulder and I look over to my sister with wide eyes. "She's okay, Michael, let her explain herself."
"Explain herself? Im sorry Anna she might as well be spouting out that I'm pregnant! I don't know if you haven't noticed but our shit father just walked out on us! She might as well be in shock!" Michael spats, and gets up from our protesting mother.
"Michael! Please! Let her speak!" Anna spats back. "I don't know if you haven't noticed either but we might as well kill ourselves now! We have never been to school nor our we educated enough to do basic ninth grade math but Castiel is a genius! He's always taught us many things Michael! He's only ten...and maybe..maybe I believe he's an angel too..."
"Anna, I believe you..." Gabriel whispers.
I frown as Michael turns his head in disgust, but the tilt of his head only shows hesitation. I don't know wether to believe her or to turn my head, but I've always known I was a genius. I just don't know how to associate me being a genius to me being an angel.
For all I know I could be dead right now.
Lucifer watches silently as he cleans up the blood from our Mother's hands with the damp towel as Anna asks her too explain.
"When Michael was born, Liam wasn't your father. But Liam was never any of your father's, not by blood any how. God asked me to rebirth you...into angels for the world. Not just Castiel, all of you. Your all angels. What he asked of me was something glorious, and wonderful and I couldn't say no. I just couldn't, until something went wrong..." Mina's blue eyes turn dark and cold, and an unwanted shiver flows down my spine. "It turns out you were all born as half fallen angels...I don't know how or why or even what had caused it.
"To be honest I don't believe its even possible. All I know is that for the past ten years I've been raising you five with the aging only two times slower...and that God hasn't answered any of my questions. Michael, your an angel...and I know how much you don't believe me but you have to! You have to believe me! Y-your backs! I remember your backs! Castiel, take your shirt off!" Mina grabs onto my shirt, tugging on the hem of my cotton pajamas, her used to be calm exterior suddenly crawling for someone to belive the words she says. I nod quickly, ignoring Michael's burning stare and unbutton it, slipping it off until my bare skin can shiver under the cool air.
"Oh my god." Gabriel states as he gets a closer look at my back. The irony of the situation and what he states almost makes me laugh but I keep shut, realizing how serious the situation is. The next minute grows tiring, and I want to pull away from their awed stares but I stay completely still.
"What the hell is that!?" Lucifer exclaims. The irony only grows stronger.
Mina looks up to Lucifer with wide eyes. "Its where his wings used to be...or are..." She answers.
I try to look over my shoulder to see what has made Michael speechless, but unfortunately I'm not an owl and an owl isn't me. I sigh as I realize that I won't ever know until I ask, seeing as the large mirror that used to hang over the fireplace is broken. With a wary look, I resort. "What's on my back?"
"They are scarred gashes..." Anna states as she ghosts a hand over the supposed scars over my back.
"Your lying, these can't be real! They can't be Mina! I would've seen them, why can't I remember seeing them before?" Michael protests. "Why. Haven't. I. Seen. Them."
"You have them on your back too Michael, Gabriel, Lucifer and Anna! You all have them! Its true!" Mina's cries only ring thought my ears, seeing as the thought of it being true is preposterous. Barely plausible, but seeing as it may be the only type of proof we have.
Gabriel notices my furrowed brows and slips his shirt off, revealing his gashes on his back and I understand. The two diagonal strips start from the middle of his back, and fly our toward his shoulders, getting further and further away from each other with each new curve. It's light pink, but dark enough to notice and it frightens me a bit.
Michael sighs and resigns, lifting our mother to her feet, wipes off a few shards of glass from the couch and sits her down. "What do angels do." He states simply and I notice that somewhere he believes her, and that part is winning.
"They can heal people, and read people's minds, they can also fly...the wings...but a bit more like transport. And if strong enough they can also go back in Time...and exorcise demons and do a bunch if other things with just a touch of your fingers...because of your grace." She trails off and I watch as her nimble fingers twirl and cork around the hem of her shirt.
So, if I was an angel, I could heal my mothers cut knuckles right now?
I throw the experiment around in my head a bit, finally deciding that yes it could possibly work if what she says is true, and tell my body to surge the grace onto me. The power of faith leaps through my fingers and for a second I wonder if I could go back in time and steer Liam away from my mother, but I push the thought away and place my fingers onto my mothers knuckles.
For three seconds, nothing happens.
Then, I feel it, a warmth running through the bottom of my stomach to my finger tips. It's like a warm blanket, or the feeling of being wrapped up into a mothers forgiving arms, or when the joy you can't contain flys out of your mouth into laughter and for second everything stops.
The cuts disappear, grace cleansing any bruise or cut or slash or crusted blood. Everything that has shown a place of violence for my mother is cleansed, and the word that comes from my mouth then is something that I haven't heard of in a long time.
"Faith."
