.

VII.

The future's in the air
I can feel it everywhere
Blowing with the wind of change

Dean was in an exceptionally good mood. His day had started with another bacon burger – the main reason being that he still hadn't bothered to do any grocery shopping – and a call from Sammy, who first seemed suspicious of Dean's sudden cheerfulness, but later in the conversation joined him with a few cheesy jokes and good, ol' bitchy remarks instead of the constant carefulness. For a moment, it felt like he was back in the old days.

When he arrived at work, he had pleasantly surprised Bobby by being early for once. After a cup of coffee, Dean was told to go work on a car that had come in earlier that morning. It was quite an easy job; he finished within two hours so he decided to go check on the car he had been working on the day before. As he had already thought, he had fixed the problem; satisfied with himself, he went looking for Bobby to report his progress. He found him in his kitchen, and before he knew it, a bottle of beer was pressed into his hands.

Dean found out that there weren't any other cars to work on for today, so he just finished this beer and started another one before he realized that he could be working on his Impala at this very moment. So he excused himself and made his way to garage D.

The smile never left Dean's face while he was tinkering with his car. He didn't even know why, but he was quite excited for tonight. He had already mentally listed a few questions he'd like to ask Castiel, and a few places they should definitely visit.

"So, what's her name?" Without Dean even noticing, Bobby had entered the garage and sat down on a box near him. Dean looked up for a second before continuing his work.

"Whose name?" he asked, slightly confused.

"Of that chick you're about to bang," Bobby said drily. Dean looked up again with a shocked face that clearly had an unspoken 'what?!' written upon it. Bobby smirked, and shrugged innocently. "I've known you all your life, boy. I know that look on your face. You've either won a life time of free pies, or you're going on a date tonight."

"I'm not gonna bang anyone tonight," Dean said resolutely and went back to work, a small frown forming on his face.

"Then what," he heard Bobby ask, or rather, demand.

Dean rolled his eyes and glared at Bobby. "I'm just in a good mood, okay? Ain't got nothing to do with chicks or somethin'."

Bobby was quiet for a moment, and Dean continued his work in silence. His own defensiveness had surprised even himself, and while he was tinkering some further, he tried to figure out why he was even being this way.

"What's his name, then?" Bobby asked a while later.

Dean just ignored his question for a minute before putting down the wrench he was holding, and looking at Bobby.

"Castiel," he said. "But like I said, it ain't a date. He's just some dude who's new in town and I'm gonna show him his way around, okay?"

"Oh really," Bobby drawled. "When, again?"

"After work," Dean answered shortly.

"So you're gonna show him around town while it's dark? Sounds like one of your better ideas."

Dean blinked and realized Bobby was right. It really was kinda stupid to decide to give someone a tour around town while said person couldn't even see where they were going. Suddenly, the remains of Dean's good mood turned into anxiousness, gnawing at his stomach. What if Castiel had only agreed to make Dean shut up and stop bothering him about it? He shook his head, and decided to stop thinking about it. He was just going to go where and when he was expected; if Castiel didn't show up, it was his loss, right?

Dean was glad when Bobby didn't press the matter. They ended up working on the car together for another few hours until Bobby left to prepare his dinner. This was also the moment that Dean decided that it would be a good idea to leave early today so that he could wash off the oil and sweat before meeting Castiel. The gnawing, anxious feeling still hadn't left Dean's body. But, he reminded himself, the man had seemed earnestly excited when Dean had proposed to meet him again.

So Dean took a quick shower and a neglected bar of chocolate he found in an otherwise empty drawer before driving back to the street where he had dropped Castiel off. He made sure to park at the other side of the road though, definitely not wanting to have another meeting with the real owners of the house he had thought to be Castiel's. He was a bit early, but somehow, Dean imagined Castiel to be someone to get to appointments early rather than later, so he kept his guard up.

Unfortunately, Dean seemed to be wrong. After waiting for half an hour, Dean had already cleared two levels of Candy Crush and nearly hurled his phone through the window because of Flappy Bird, but Castiel was still nowhere to be seen. With a sigh, Dean put his phone away, and looked around in a futile attempt to find someone in a tan trench coat. The only thing he saw was that it had started to snow. He muttered a curse under his breath and turned up the heat of the Challenger. It wasn't that he was cold; he just hated the mere idea of it, and tried to shoo it away with over excessive warmth.

Minutes passed and with every minute, a bit of Dean's confidence did, too. His fingers nervously drummed on the steering wheel and his eyes flicked back to the street every few seconds. The darkness had now completely taken over the world, and he was quite sure that Castiel had either forgotten or decided not to come. It was probably the second option.

He felt so stupid. He should have seen it earlier; how Castiel had reacted to him when he came closer, how he had tried to politely reject his offers. The anxious feeling twisted and turned and slowly formed itself back into the black hole that had been absent for two glorious days. Dean just stared into the distance for a few minutes, giving the last remains of his hope a chance to leave. He half-heartedly looked around once more to make sure there still wasn't any sign of a man in a trench coat and then drove away with a deep sigh.

Everything in him screamed to go home and go to bed and never get out of it again, but the rational part of Dean's mind told him that there were better things to do with his life than moping around. Like, for example, buying groceries, because he had officially run out of food this morning. He took a quick look at his watch to find out that he had exactly 23 minutes left before every shop near him would close.

Dean vaguely wondered why this all was affecting him so much; sure, the man had kind of turned his life around and all that, but that didn't immediately mean that he was supposed to stay in it, right? Maybe it was for the best. Maybe he should just try to scramble back the pieces of his old life and put them back together as well as possible and maybe he shouldn't allow any strangers into his life just yet.

Before Dean could think any further, he realized he had already passed the convenience store he usually went to. He cursed and started looking for a parking spot, which turned out to be harder than expected. Apparently he wasn't the only one who went shopping a few minutes before closing time.

When he found a free spot at last, he still had to walk for he-didn't-want-to-know-how-many minutes until he'd reach the shop. He pushed his hands deep into his pockets and hid as much of his chin in his coat's collar as was physically possible, and jogged the distance. He squinted his eyes, as the snow was trying to blind him and soon his nose began to ache. It was so damn freakin' cold. He really couldn't imagine how anyone could ever like winter.

He felt relieved when he finally entered the warm shop, but it soon turned into annoyance when he was told that the shop was going to close in five minutes. He quickly explained that he really, really needed some food and then ran into the store to do some speed shopping. He grabbed some bread, another box of hamburgers, a few apples and a dozen eggs, then thoughtfully stared at the shelf with pies and ditched the apples for an apple pie. What was the difference, anyway.

This entire time, he felt the employees staring at him, so he decided he'd just come back another time and eat a hamburger with eggs for dinner. He paid, and when he left the store, the door was immediately locked behind him.

Dean wrapped the handle of the plastic bag that contained his groceries around his wrist and put his hands back in his pockets. It was still snowing; Dean glared at the little snowflakes performing their delicate dance in their fall from the sky and then started walking back to his car.

A not very healthy sounding cough to his right made him slow down. He looked up and saw a small fire, which's light revealed a girl with messy brown hair and another human figure that was wrapped in some dirty looking rags. The girl was kneeling down in front of the other and seemed to be speaking to them. Dean almost felt bad for them because they had to be outside in this kind of weather, but he was way too busy pitying himself to care; it was not like he could help them, anyway.
He was about to continue his walk to the car, when another cough stopped him. It sounded bad. And somehow also familiar. Dean frowned and tried to get another look at the two hobos when the person that was wrapped in the blankets shifted slightly so that the light of the fire gave a better view of them. Dean froze and just stared for a moment.

"Son of a bitch."

The girl's eyes snapped to Dean; she frowned as he quickly made his way towards them.

"The fuck are you-" she started, but was interrupted by Dean who, not very subtly, shoved her away and knelt down in front of the miserable looking man who was violently shivering with his eyes half closed.

"Cas, what the fuck are you doing here?" Dean asked urgently, gently nudging his shoulder. "Castiel?"

"He isn't talking," he heard the girl next to him say. Dean pulled his eyes away from Castiel to look at her, his hand still holding the other man's shoulder. "So, let me take a guess; you're Dean?"

"What?" Dean nearly snapped and then looked back at Castiel again. "Eh, yeah, whatever that's worth. But what the hell is Cas doing here?"

"He's here because your sorry ass didn't even notice he had lost his home," she drawled, and shuffled a bit closer; she smiled sardonically but her eyes were flaming. "Y'know, he's been talking about you all day. He made you sound like some kind of hero, but let me tell you something. Someone who can't even recognize when his friend is in trouble is a worthless piece of shit."

"Why, thank you," Dean said cynically. Suddenly, he understood. This is was the reason why Castiel hadn't wanted to be taken home or couldn't give a phone number and why he had been so damn hungry the day he met him. He felt a pang of guilt sear through him; why hadn't he noticed? "Just so you know, I only met him two days ago. You're full of crap."

The girl frowned slightly. "That's not what he told me."

Dean sighed exasperatedly. "Then what did he tell you? Never mind, I don't have time for this bullshit."

At that moment, a raw voice sounded in front of him.

"Dean." Said man quickly averted his eyes back to Castiel, who was looking at him with a radiant smile and glassy eyes.

"Cas," Dean said breathlessly and the hand that had still been on Castiel's shoulder quickly wandered off to his cheek, checking its temperature. He was burning with fever. "You were totally out, man. How are you feeling? How did you even end up here?"

"Get a room, you two," Dean heard the girl mutter.

"Shut the fuck up," he hissed in return, his eyes still fixated on Castiel. The other man just smiled until his eyes closed again; the smile slowly faded.

"Shit," Dean muttered and shook his shoulders again. "C'mon, stay with me, buddy."

Castiel blinked a few times before his eyes focused on Dean.

"I'm not feeling well," he said hoarsely; as if to prove his point he started coughing again. Dean could hear slime rattling in the other man's lungs.

Dean was panicking slightly. What was he supposed to do? He couldn't just leave him here because he'd most likely die. Bringing him to the hospital was no option, as the man probably didn't have health insurance. He could take him home, but that would be kinda weird.
One more look at Castiel made him resolutely change his mind, however.

"C'mere," Dean muttered, and moved the blankets so that he could grab Castiel's armpits and drag him up. "I'm taking you home, okay? You're gonna be fine. I got you."

He heard some gagging sounds in the background; when he looked, he saw the girl with her arms defensively crossed over her chest looking at them.

"Are you just gonna stand there and watch?" Dean said, rather infuriated.

"I'd have offered to help you, but I remember being told to – oh, what was it again? Shut the fuck up, perhaps?" she said with a sugary smile.

Dean incredulously shook his head and grabbed Castiel a bit tighter around his waist.

"You're fucking sickening, you know that?" he spat, before turning his had to Castiel, who seemed to be nodding off again. "Come on, Cas. We're leaving."

It took him a lot of effort, but they reached his car eventually. Dean helped Castiel in and buckled his belt for him. He closed the door; when he turned around, he suddenly stood face to face with the brown haired girl from earlier.

"Woah," he half-shouted. "Private space! Why the hell are you following me?"

The girl took a step back with an indistinct smile.

"You forgot something, sunshine."

Dean looked down and saw the plain white grocery bag in her hand. He frowned and grabbed it away from her before stalking away to the other side of the car.

"You're welcome, by the way," he heard her voice behind him. Dean sighed exasperatedly and dramatically turned around to face her again.

"Thank you so fucking much," Dean replied. "I hope that's what you wanted to hear, because – I don't know? I have a man in my car who's sick to death?"

"A man who actually would be dead if it weren't for me." The girl came closer and stared at him with a clenched jaw. "Did you really think the blankets that kept him warm were his? Because they aren't. Let me tell you a little secret." She narrowed her eyes. "He's literally got nothing."

Dean's panic and anger dulled slightly. He quietly stared at the girl for a second before walking back to the car door where he gently took the blankets away from Castiel, who immediately started shivering again. He draped the blankets over the open car door for a moment, unzipped his own coat and covered Cas with it. He closed the door and with the blankets, he walked back to the girl, who was witnessing all this with a raised eyebrow.

"Thanks," he said shortly, and pushed the blankets in her hands. Her lips twitched up in a smile.

"That's more like it."

Dean shivered from the cold, feeling it in all its glory now he wasn't protected by his coat. Before returning to his car, however, he took his wallet out of his pocket, looked through it and took out a bill of fifty dollars.

"Keep safe," he said curtly, and handed the money to the girl, who looked at it warily before taking it.

"I can take care of myself," she said as she tucked to bill safely away in her pocket. Then, she nodded to the car. "You better make sure he's gonna be okay. Because if he isn't, I'll know, and I will find you."

Something in her voice told Dean that this wasn't a joke.


I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! Mailaine, I hope it's clear which Meg it is now. I didn't really elaborate on it in the previous chapter, because I don't think that Castiel really notices someone's appearance, especially now, because he has only been on earth for a few days. Anyway, it's the second version of Meg, because I like her much more. c:
The next chapter will not have any lyrics as prologue…