Edited

2

Family Matters

Meanwhile at the bunker…

Castiel sat on his bed. His new bed. In the room that Sam and Dean had set aside for him. The thought made him so genuinely happy that he smiled as he glanced around the space.

The room was simple: A bed (quite big), a single wood dresser, one night stand, and what he thought was an old music playing device—long and black with a lot of buttons. Without needing to ask, he was sure this had been an addition Dean would have insisted on.

But the most notable aspect of the room? Quiet.

Dean's absence fought for his attention. Everything would work out, he assured himself. He knew Dean had faults but it was the nature of them that made it difficult to help the man. It was upsetting how little the hunter thought of himself. And his stubborn, blind attitude was infuriating—there was no breaking through. It made Cas' blood boil thinking of how childish Sam had also been acting since they'd gotten back.

Those damn Winchester brothers… Castiel sighed.

Sam of all people knew the hard life that Dean had suffered through. Not that the younger Winchester hadn't had it easy either but there was an innocence to Sam that didn't exist in Dean. Sam was more… resilient.

Even though the younger Winchester had been forced into the affects from demon influence, he maintained faith and utter piety. Castiel had never understood how the other angels deplored Sam Winchester. The boy had overcome Lucifer! Such a magnificent, almost unbelievable feat, and it candidly reflected his strength of character.

Dean on the other hand…

Well, Dean certainly was righteous. But the man was dark in ways that Sam wasn't. It was a strange thought for Castiel. As most people he'd known at some point believed Sam Winchester was the boy whose soul was tainted black. Arguably, there was a modicum of truth to that. Where the brothers differed, however, was that Dean created his own darkness. It was never thrust upon him by some yellow-eyed demon in the dark when he was just an infant; Dean allowed his mistakes, and his short-comings to blacken him on the inside. This was far more damaging.

Castiel could still picture the sight of Dean's soul when he'd first come across it in Hell. It had been so bright at the core…so pure. Nearly perfect. It called to him through the shadows with such clarity and purpose that there had been no mistaking who the righteous man was. But as time passed, that soul had become chipped and burned at the edges.

Castiel heaved a sigh and let his body rest against the headboard of the creaky decades' old bed-frame. As he pushed aside his musings on the Winchesters, he decided it was time to have a talk with Sam.

/\/\/\

Hunched over a book in the library, Sam felt hollow on the inside, the rest of him stiff and perpetually uncomfortable. His tall, fit body hadn't fully recovered, despite the last week of healing Cas had unleashed on him. The emptiness, he knew, had absolutely nothing to do with his physical state of crap.

The relationship with his brother was so far beyond broken he didn't even know how to come to terms with the wreckage that was left behind.

They were just so…so fucked up!

There was no doubt they loved each other—that was never the problem. The problem was that it was an unhealthy, distorted kind of love where they didn't know how to each be their own person, and support each other, and trust each other in any normal, healthy sort of way. Dean wasn't entirely to blame, Sam had blame in this for sure, but things needed to change. That was why he'd let Dean walk away. It killed him that Dean didn't see it; that Dean actually thought he was some weird cosmic magnet for death because c'mon man, seriously?

Whatever…

As much as he missed his brother, they just couldn't bounce back from this. A part of him truly wished Dean had let him die, and the resentment he felt for that wouldn't go away overnight. It bothered him, of course, to see Dean so depressed and all self-loathing but Sam knew that they needed to stay away from each other for a bit.

Sitting up, he realized with a jolt of clarity that Gabriel had been right all along. He and Dean needed to learn to live without each other.

Lesson learned.

It was times like this when Sam felt the urge to punch the great John Winchester… if he could. Yes, he completely understood why their dad had raised them the way he had and Sam had already come to terms with the fact that John had only been trying to watch out for them—knowing the life they would have.

But…Come ON! Their dad had forced them into a brotherly relationship that wasn't even half-way sustainable. It was like Sam and Dean were atoms that needed the other's existence to exist themselves, and yet when the atoms were too close they would collide into anti-matter and explode the whole friggin' universe. The analogy might've sounded ridiculous at first, but had the two of them not caused and then derailed a worldly apocalypse?! Sounded pretty damn accurate to him!

Sam sighed in contempt at the situation, shoving the book towards the middle of the table in an angry motion. What had he been reading, anyway? Shit, he hadn't been able to focus all week. His mind kept replaying everything from the other night. Every time he pictured Dean saying he was poison, it just made him angrier. Dean was so…so goddamned thick-headed sometimes, and stubborn, and inconsiderate, and just uurggghh! Sam ground his teeth together in frustration.

The air shifted, creating a prickle at the back of his neck. Cas had finally come down from his room then. Barely shifting to look over his shoulder, he tainted the fallen angel's arrival with his perpetual sullen glare. He didn't mean anything by it; it was just the only expression he was capable of.

"Sam," Cas greeted, narrowing his blue eyes in Sam's direction.

"Hey," he replied tersely. The air between them had been charged since Dean left. Neither wanted to discuss the elephant in the room that was his brother's absence.

"How are you?" Castiel walked towards him, taking a seat in the chair at the head of the table.

Sam snorted and shrugged. There were no appropriate words to answer that question and Cas knew it.

His friend reached across the table to place a hand on his forearm in a gesture of comfort and comradeship in this shitty situation. They shared a helpless look but neither said a word.

Cas was quick to stand again, leaning over to place two fingers to Sam's forehead. The light and purity washed through him and a measure of peace and happiness weaved its way in. It was the same sensation every time Cas did this, and Sam appreciated it. It was a brief moment in the day where he didn't feel the desire to scream out of frustration or fume in anger. He wondered if Cas always felt like this; this sort of… peace and purity. If he did, Sam was grateful.

When the deed was done, he opened his eyes, glancing up. Half expecting to see the reflection of peace on the angel's face, Sam was caught for words by the sheer grief he found instead. Moving slowly, Castiel slumped back into the chair with an almost visible weight on his shoulders. The image was depressing.

"Are you okay?" Sam asked, his voice tight with concern. He mentally slapped himself for taking a whole week to ask. Cas loved Dean; a fact Sam had known for some time now. Dean had walked away from both of them. Even though Sam knew that he and Dean needed to be apart, it had been a dick move walking away from Cas as well.

"I'm, well, not fine certainly, but…" Cas blew out a breath and shook his head, "I don't know," he concluded defeatedly.

"Yeah," he agreed. "Same."

"Sam, would it upset you if I tried to bring him back?" Cas' question made him cringe. He'd been hoping this conversation would've been pushed off for a bit longer.

There was no reply that he could offer that would appease Cas. He was worried about Dean, and that gave him a moment's pause, but the thought of Dean standing in front of him unleashed his anger. Instantly, Sam remembered full-well why they needed to be away from each other.

"I… I don't think that's a good idea, Cas. I think my brother and I need different lives for a little while. Ya' know?" Sam explained as he repeatedly fisted and flexed his hands over and over again, staring down at the table.

The whole situation… this whole life was too… damaged.

Curving the sullen conversation, Cas' attitude did a complete one-eighty, startling Sam into a straighter posture.

"I get that the two of you have 'issues'," Cas began harshly, with included air-quotes, "but Dean is suffering needlessly. He's depressed and hates himself right now. Do you really want to find out in a week from now that he went on some suicide mission and got himself killed?!" Cas had stood. The rise of his voice reached a level where it reverberated throughout the large room. The angel wasn't yelling exactly. More like speaking with celestial forcefulness.

Sam stared in awe, flinching at the notion of what Cas was saying.

Of course he didn't want that to happen.

"C'mon, Cas. You know I don't want that. What do you want me to do?" Sam threw his hands in the air. "We can't keep going around in circles!" Every damn time! he thought. They always came back to the same problems: dying for each other, lying to each other, not trusting each other. They were faithlessly co-dependent! God, it was a brotherly relationship that psychoanalysts could write books about!

It annoyed Sam because he knew that Castiel mainly wanted Dean back for selfish reasons. The angel didn't care that it wasn't a good idea, he just wanted "Dean." Sam thought, angrily mocking the way Cas said his brother's name.

The two of them bristled at each other for several moments before Castiel said anything in return.

"Fine." Cas turned to stomp off, but he paused, head inclined as though he were looking at the front door. Without turning back, he spoke again in a softer, quieter voice, the words cutting Sam straight-through. "But just because something's broken doesn't mean you give up on it. You fix it, Sam. You know who taught me that?"

He hung his head, knowing the answer Cas would give.

"You two idiots." Cas brusquely walked up the stairs, slamming the door to his room with angelic force. The sound cracked its way across the open space.

Responding in kind, Sam stood and whipped his chair across the room. It didn't make him feel any better.

Not that he'd expected it to. But irrationality is like that. Fruitless actions in the hopes of calming a brewing storm.

A part of him…a deep down part of him, seated behind all that stubborn anger, knew that he was being selfish and childish. Still, it didn't matter. Sam wasn't ready to face Dean. He couldn't handle being around someone—no matter how much he loved them—that had taken away his chance at peace.

/\/\/\

Not five minutes after Castiel returned to his room following his heated discussion with the younger Winchester, he heard it.

Dean's prayer.

And it was bad. Really, really bad.