When Cas finally forces himself to make his way home, it is to a quiet kind of chaos that he arrives. Michael is pacing frantically back and forth, repeatedly tapping numbers and muttering obscenities into their battered shared phone (Lucien has his own, of course, courtesy of some rich kid from their last school that he either sweet talked or – more likely – threatened into reluctantly 'loaning' him the necessary money). Gabriel lies slumped across the one piece of living room furniture they've acquired, a hideous mauve leather structure somewhere between a sofa and a chair, shoving cheetos in the vague direction of his mouth and looking possibly more fed up than Cas has ever seen him. As well as the steadily building pile of cheetos on the floor, the room is covered with clothes and scattered papers, remnants of Luce's hasty getaway. The money pot on the desk has been left open, encircled by carelessly discarded loose change. One momentary peek reveals that only a few one dollar and two twenty dollar bills remain amongst a sea of coins – barely enough to get them through the week.

Cas doesn't need to ask to know where the rest has gone.

He doubts anyone's even noticed he's not been there – and, for once, he wouldn't blame them –, but when Michael finally clocks him, staring blankly around the ruined room, he lectures him like the search party are already on their rounds.
'Where have you been, Castiel?! What were you thinking, running off like that after Lucie's little game? You really don' think I've got enough to deal with as it is, trying to keep the school on good terms and track down our ridiculous brother, and clean up this mess, and-'
He stops suddenly, inhaling through his nose like a sniffer dog ominously ready to pounce.
'Oh, dear god, please tell me you haven't been smoking.'

This is the part where he apologises.

'I'm sorry, Michael. I was stupid and childish. It won't happen again.'
This is what he says.

Always. This is always what he says. He opens his mouth, gearing up for the inevitable. He falters, breath catching in his throat; the words don't come out.

Michael is still watching him, silently and expectantly. When Cas doesn't respond immediately, he folds his arms across his chest and glowers.
'Well? What have you got to say for yourself?'

Cas isn't sure what it is that gets into him now. He isn't sure why he's so angry. It's not like he approves of smoking – not like he's ever planning on doing it again, no matter what the girl with the pretty eyes and the scary smile has to say. On the contrary: he disagrees with a smoking, for a number of social, ethical, and (obviously) health-related reasons.

So maybe it's just stupidity, or petty teenage rebellion, or something; he doesn't know.

All Castiel Novak knows is that whatever the hell gets into him at this moment feels an awful lot like bravery.

'You know what, Michael?' Cas isn't quite shouting, but he's close. Michael's eyes widen and even Gabriel looks up from his food in curious surprise. Cas never raises his voice – not against his brothers, not against Michael.
'I have had it up to here –' He raises his left hand to the level of his face in demonstration. ' – with you! With all of you! Why do you care where I was? You never even notice if I'm there! You never even notice anything unless it threatens your place as Daddy's perfect little boy!'
Michael's eyes darken. 'That's enough, Castiel.'
'When do I get to decide what's enough? I'm nearly seventeen! Who cares if I talk back, or stay out late, or smoke? Dad sure as hell doesn't! Why are we always trying to please him when he's never even there?'

He stops, breathlessly awaiting Michael's response.

'Go to your room,' his brother says finally, quietly severe. 'You may be nearly seventeen, little brother, but you are still very much a child. Your little outburst just proved that.'
'Gladly!' Castiel shoots back, grabbing his bag and heading towards the stairs. He is still full of thunder – unsure why, but not quite ready to let it go. 'Assbutt.'
He mutters the last bit, already halfway up the stairs. He is neither expecting nor desiring a response.

Unfortunately, he has failed to take Michael's super-sonic hearing into account.

'What did you just call me?!'
Cas takes a deep breathing, summoning all of his courage (or stupidity, or whatever).
'I said, ASSBUTT!'

'Assbutt?!'
'You've repeated that seven times now, Dean,' Cas says, trying to remain patient, 'And yes, that is still what I said.'
Dean snorts with laughter, taking a long slurp of chocolate milkshake and shaking his head in bemusement.
'Well, you sure told him. Remind me not to get on the wrong side of you, yeah?'
'It's not funny, Dean.' His friend looks unconvinced; in fact, he looks downright mocking, and Cas feels a flicker of yesterday's fire start to burn at the back of his throat.
'It is pretty funny, though,' Dean says, 'I mean, I get you stood up to your brother, and dude, that's good for you, but – assbutt?!'
To say that Cas is beginning to regret telling Dean this story would be quite possibly the greatest understatement known to man.
'It was a pivotal moment of my life thus far,' he replies, too distracted by Dean's perpetual snickering even to focus on the food on his plate (and he's starving, not having realised before how uncomfortably reliant he is on Michael's culinary skills for even the simplest of meals).'I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't make fun of me for it anymore.'
Honestly, he's a good mind to stomp right out of the cafeteria and call Dean an assbutt too – but he's a horrible feeling that might backfire (besides which, he could do without losing his one and only friend).

'Hey, princess,' Meg saunters past them, tray in hands and smirk as wide as ever. Still, he notices a softness in her expression, partially recognisable from their encounter on the stairs but definitely not from the classroom. One of his only two friends, maybe. 'Good to see you stuck around.'

After she leaves, Dean stays gawping after her for a frankly uncomfortable amount of time. Cas waits patiently for as long as he can manage. Then –
'Please stop staring, Dean.'
'Meg?!' Dean shakes his head again, expression even more bemused than before, and Cas is momentarily thankful that his friend's found something even more worthy of scornful disbelief than assbutt.
'Meg?' he asks again.
'Yes, Dean, that was-'
'You and Meg?!'
'Are you playing some kind of game to see how many times you can repeat the same things over and over again before I hit you?' Cas cuts in, surprising himself for the second time in two days. He isn't used to doing that. 'Because I feel like you should know that you're getting dangerously close.'

Dean's eyes narrow. Cas is briefly but intensely worried that this is it – that he's blown it, like he knew it would before it even begun. That Dean will stand up and leave, walk out without another word – ignore him in classes, snigger at him in the corridors, maybe even start rumours. Or worse – he'll punch him. It's not that Castiel can't fight – it's not that at all –, but he'd really rather not. Speaking from experience, being the weird kid who broke that guy's nose really isn't all that much better than being just the weird kid.

It's more than that, too – more than the simple desire to avoid booking a return ticket to isolation, to social leper-hood (as well-adjusted as he had become to that lifestyle, it sucks). It's Dean. He likes Dean, a lot, for all their differences and for all his mockery. He doesn't want to lose him before their friendship's even properly begun.

Cas opens his mouth – and then, just before he can blurt out some excruciatingly pathetic plea ('I'm sorry, please don't go, I've never had a best friend before'), Dean's mouth breaks into a grin and he lets out another guffaw of laughter.

'Okay, okay, I get it. Assbutt. Meg. Pivotal moments all around.'

Cas is so relieved he forgets to be mad and laughs too, loudly and borderline hysterically.

It's nice having friends.

(Still, he could swear Dean is weirdly off with him for the rest of the day – and never moreso than in English, when they're told to get into groups of three and Meg shoots him an inviting grin that has him inviting her to join the pair of them before he even knows what he's doing.)

When Cas gets home that afternoon – normal time; he seriously considers delaying for the sake of winding Michael up, but ultimately realises he has neither the nerve nor the malice required –, the living room has been cleaned and Michael, though on the phone again and with big dark bags under his eyes, is looking unnervingly calm. Once he gets off the phone, he beckons Cas over and calmly asks him what he wants for tea – and, for reasons unbeknown to the both of them, Cas is so touched by this that he damn near bursts into tears.

He is filled suddenly with an unfamiliar and overwhelming rush of affection for his brother – for his exhausted, vigilant, dedicated brother – his brother who could get into any college he wants at the drop of a hat, in spite of all those classes he's missed to take care of them, but who chooses to stick around all the same. It's not Michael's fault that their dad's never there; it's not Michael's fault that he's stressed, or that with Lucien causing trouble and Gabriel being a general nuisance and the never-ending struggle to keep food on the table and the authorities from the door Cas is often something of an embarrassing afterthought.

'Castiel?' Michael repeats, a hint of annoyance in his voice now. He may have more than his fair share of virtues, but patience certainly isn't one of them. 'What do you want to eat? And please, for the love of god, do not say pop tarts.'
Cas is momentarily confused – but his desire to enquire disappears at the sight of Gabriel's impish grin, his younger brother standing in the hall, leaning through the doorway and eyeing the exchange with an alarmingly Lucien-esque mixture of amusement and contempt.

'That would be ridiculous,' Cas says simply (honestly). Michael smiles in relief. Gabriel scowls, sticks his tongue out and turns away. 'I'll cook something. To make up for...you know.'

'Assbutt?' Gabriel, reappearing without warning, offers helpfully. Castiel hadn't realised it was possible, but his youngest brother actually looks even more amused than Dean.

Thankfully, Michael does not.

'Go to your room, Gabriel,' he says simply, 'No arguing. I know full well you've got homework to be getting on with.'

If looks could kill, Michael would be on the floor right now. As they can't, however, Gabriel is at something of a loss, and, after several moments of intense and angry staring, is forced to admit defeat and slope reluctantly up the stairs.

Michael stares after him, shaking his head as if in disbelief. (Having spent almost his entire life as the effective guardian of Lucien, Castiel wouldn't have thought such an emotion were even possible anymore.) Then he turns his attention back to Cas.

'That'd be great, Castiel.' His voice is so gentle and so earnest it's actually quite unnerving – so gentle and earnest Cas is half expecting him to launch into some ridiculous tirade about what a great kid he is, and that he's no longer only worrying about himself bursting into tears.

This being the case, it's actually a pretty massive relief when the phone rings and Michael jumps, snapping straight out of his short-lived sweetness and back into Militant Big Brother Mode.

Cas' eyes flicker over to the clock – unnecessarily, he knows, as Michael's internal clock is quite consistently in sync with their father's life. How anything could be in sync with something so mysterious is just one of Michael's many inexplicable abilities.

It's 5pm, exactly, of course.

'There are just two things we can rely on Daddy dearest for,' Lucien has said on more than one occasion, his tone positively dripping with bitterness. 'One – to never, ever be there when we need him, to always put himself first and generally just consistently go that extra mile to be the worst father in existence.'
('That's three things, really,' Cas had pointed out once, getting glares from both Luce and Michael for his trouble.)
'And number two – to ring at 5pm on the dot, each and every Tuesday, whether we want him to or not, and bless his sons with a good five minutes of his vocal presence before he clears right off again. Lucky, lucky us.'

You could say what you wanted about their father (though you'd be hard pressed to think of something Lucien hasn't already said, probably numerous times and in much more colourful language), but nobody could deny he was a man of precision.

Michael's words come out in a rush as he moves towards the loudly vibrating phone, and, though his voice is now completely devoid of emotion – like a sergeant barking military orders, his father's son, Lucien would say –, Castiel can tell he's panicking.

Brother's intuition, or something.

'Dad doesn't know about Lucien yet, don't want to worry him unnecessarily, I'll keep trying to get in touch with Lucien and sort this out and if and when I think it's right I'll let him know. If he asks where he is, he's out with friends and he's settling into school well – not too well, we don't want Dad getting suspicious, but well enough for him, making friends and going to classes at least. You both know I don't like lying to our father if I can help it, but circumstances are exceptional and if I find out either you or Gabriel has told him anything without permission there will be consequences. Understand?'

'You won't tell him about the smoking, will you?' Cas asks, feeble-sounding even to his own ears. Michael looks at him with pure, unadulterated contempt, and picks up the phone without even dignifying him with a response.

(Back to normal, then.)