Chapter 4

Life is no love story. Life is more like a thriller. Peacefully and beautiful it begins, but it doesn't stay that way. It is a serial of abstruse incidents and every time you start to rest and think everything is good, the next nerve-wrecking thing happens. A long film, forged by the insatiably back-breaking nature of life. But life is not the monster, life is only the stage. The monster, that destroys everything in the end and eventually ruins the happy end, that are and always will be ourselves.

„Fuck" Dean mumbled into his more or less white pillow, when a horrible plastic alarm clock beside his bed formed its typical shrill sound to wake him up. It was definitely too early. The alarm clock didn't seem to have in plan to stop. Dean turned, grabbed it and threw it against a pathetically painted wall of his motel room. Another exhausted humming later, that vibrated through his body like a wave of displeasure, he eventually sat up, little pleased with the day, even when it was still young. With akin tiredness he rubbed his eyes and yawned, when the alarm clock made noise again, his gaze pointed somewhere else, though.

„Damn it!"

„Dean."

„How long have you been sitting there? Did you watch me sleep?"

Something in Cas' face looked like amusement. Something else looked like tiredness.

„No."

Castiel hadn't slept that night. And none of the other nights either. Angles don't sleep. Almost motionless he had been sitting here waiting for the human to be done resting. Something had been loading his eye lids and forcing him to concentrate, something that made his lumps burdened and rigid.

Dean made several proud steps towards him and built up in front of him. His face covered in sleep, his hair tumultuous and aggressive and his eyes glaring. His nostrils trembling and breath pumped out of his nose just as heavily as it sank into the angel's lungs.

„You can't be here all the time, Cas" he spit „Look for something to do"

„Dean" the angel began, but his efforts were of no meaning.

„No! You can't sit here all night, while I'm sleeping, that's creepy! I need my rest! And you can't cling onto me all the time, Cas, it drives me crazy! I need personal space and room to breathe and -„

„The oxygen in this room is enough for two persons." Castiel explained unimpressed by the raised voice, still he startled, when the abrupt fall of an innocent glass predominated everything and the volume of shattering material freed the room from sound completely.

Dean breathed heavily, his face distorted into a grimace of anger. Drops of sweat were glittering on his forehead and somewhat you hoped they would cool down the glow in his eyes. Was it bad mood or bad sleep, there was no stopping it. The feeling demanded being felt and no matter where it came from, he knew where it wanted to go. Maybe it was being overburdened, maybe pent-up frustration or overwrought nerves. Or maybe even envy. Nobody would want a situation like this one. Nobody would want someone with you, who triggered insecurity and the choking feeling of failure. And he saw it completely logical to envy those, who were not him.

Castiel knew anger. Knew all outburst of it, uncontrolled and not to be tamed. No negotiating, no escape. It threatened to disunite them, even if they wouldn't ever be one. It threatened to break much more than already was, because it was hard not to take the attacks on him personally. They were misplaced and free of any logic and irrational. And they hurt the human sprout of his inhuman inside.

Constantly he thought he had to please him. To play after his rules. All that was important were Dean's feelings, Dean's condition. Thought he had to make sure that he was okay. Built him up, when he wasn't alright, even when he wasn't to built up. Comfort him, even when it wasn't possible. He had to bear his moods and leave him alone whenever he wanted to be let alone. And Castiel didn't let himself be mad about it. Or to hate it when Dean took his anger and bad mood out on him yet another time. He accepted and swallowed it. And he didn't let himself ask for something in return. He was dealing fine the way it was. Didn't complain. He was fine, because he needed to be fine. Because he had to be there for him.

Castiel needed to be stronger. Because Dean seemed more important to him than himself, even when the Winchester didn't seem to be aware of that. The world turned around Dean. And Castiel was fine with it. He had to protect him. It couldn't make him be angry that he was ignored whenever he spoke. Or disappointed whenever he wasn't seen. Because there was something inside him that told him not to be, that he would lose Dean otherwise.

And he had dealt with the fact that he didn't get back the same willingness. That Dean probably would never be as worried about him as he was. But he had to please him, be strong for him, play after his rules. Because something inside him said it was right and that he wasn't allowed to ask for something back. And he knew Dean would see it differently, would call some of Castiel's actions egoistic, as if he would only think of himself at everything he did. Castiel would break. Even alone the sureness that he wanted to sacrifice himself for Dean, wanted, needed, should, and wouldn't get anything in return, ripped him apart in the inside. At some point he would dissolve.

And still he couldn't do anything, but give the attention Dean needed. Bear his anger and see it and understand it. And maybe provoke it. Because feelings demanded to be felt and every destroyed ruin could become something good in the quiet after the storm.