Author's Note: Wow, this was honestly harder to write than I had first anticipated (in the beginning, I didn't know which secrets to reveal and which ones to save for later) but finally, I'm back to present the chapter you've all been waiting for: The one detailing Castiel's past. I hope this clears up any confusion and misconceptions about him and his background. I'm glad that so many people are enjoying this and I can't wait to spin this tale even more than I already had. But enough about me-let's just get to reading.

"I wasn't always like this, you know," Castiel told him plainly with his eyes fixated on the ground, determined not to meet Dean's piercing gaze as he spoke, "This depressed loser that desperately wants to just fade into the shadows of others obviously better than him. I used to be happy, Dean; I used to be normal."

"You're not a loser, Cas," Dean insisted sternly as he laid a tentative hand on Castiel's sagging shoulders and gave it a light squeeze before cracking a grin and adding, "And besides, normal is overrated."

Castiel gave him a wilted smile as he said softly, "Those statements are matters of opinion and unfortunately, they're apart of a very slim minority."

Dean sighed as he dropped his hand to fall back at his side and paused for a moment, hesitant to even ask a question in fear that it would only make Cas shut down completely and then all of Dean's sacrifices and efforts would all be in vain, before he eventually asked gently, "Cas…can you tell me more about your birth family?"

Castiel's smile faltered as his eyes grew sorrowful, a slightly pained expression reflecting on his face as if it physically ached to even think about them, before he nodded weakly and began, "My parents were Amelia and Jimmy Novak. My father was a Sales Provider for AM radio while my mother stayed home and cared for me and my younger sister, Claire. We lived in a modestly sized house in Pontiac, Illinois, and for the first six years of my life, it was amazing. I had a loving and attentive mother that let me help cook dinner and sang me a lullaby every night until I fell asleep, a mischievous little sister that I loved to tease and build a pillow fort with in the living room, and a congenial father that let me choose which tie he wore to work each day and drove me to school every morning.

"Dean, I had everything I could ever wish for—sincere friends that actually cared whether I remained breathing or not, a nurturing environment to call home, and the best parents a child could hope for; they never expected me to be the smartest kid in the my grade, or yell at me when I got a B on a test instead of an A. They just loved me for me, not what I should be.

"Living there was so perfect that every time I look back on it, I keep thinking it was all just some fantasy I cooked up inside my mind and there really was never a time I had ever been so content with my life. But I have and unfortunately, that just makes living this demanding lifestyle even more unbearable with every waking moment."

"What happened?" Dean asked softly, not wanting to push him too far but his own dying curiosity was starting to get the best of him, "Why would your family just give you up for adoption if they were still alive?" For the first few minutes, Castiel was utterly silent as he closed his eyes tightly and hugged his knees tighter to his chest, his breathing getting shallower and shallower as time progressed.

But just as Dean was about to take his question back and tell him he didn't have to answer if he didn't want to (and Castiel obviously didn't), Cas slowly opened his eyes and spoke, his voice quietly and hoarse as he forced the words out, "M-My father…he was very…" He cleared his throat and took in a deep breath before speaking again, this time his voice sounding louder and steadier, "He became very sick."

Dean furrowed his brow, "What do you mean by sick? Like, sick as in illness wise or—"

"He was crazy, Dean," Castiel blurted out suddenly, his voice becoming as hollow as his now vacant eyes, "He was delusional—had been since he was a child and even lived in a mental institution until he turned eighteen and went to college.

"But when he met my mother, Amelia, everything got better. She didn't treat him like he was a nut-job—of course, she didn't know anything about my father's past during that time, but it was still the first time Jimmy had ever felt like he was normal—like he was sane. He kept his…condition a secret from my mother and his other friends all throughout college and even a few years into his marriage. But then Amelia became pregnant with me, and Jimmy just freaked out. H-He thought…" Cas stopped, as if he couldn't even bear to finish.

"What?" Dean asked gently, his arm twitching at the overwhelming urge to put his arm around Castiel and pull the boy close to him (he refrained himself, of course, but it took a lot more effort than he'd ever willingly admit).

"He thought that his disease was genetic," Castiel continued almost inaudibly and Dean had to lean in a little to hear him, "He thought that I would be cursed with the same sickness he had."

"That's ridiculous," Dean scoffed, "Insanity can't be inherited." At Castiel's heart-wrenching expression as he said those words, he added softly, "Cas…you can't honestly believe—"

"He told my mother eventually," Castiel interrupted him flatly, "About his schizophrenia. She was shocked, of course. She thought my father was just as sane as everyone else, and she asked him why he didn't tell her sooner. Jimmy said he was afraid that she wouldn't have let herself fall in love with him if he had told her the truth earlier and thought that he could just keep sneaking around and hiding his pill bottles in places he knew she would never find. She was hurt at first since he waited so long to tell her, but she eventually accepted him as he was and assured him that she wasn't abandoning him just because of his insanity."

Cas let out a scoff and looked up to the bright moon looming over them, "You see, Dean, now that's love." He paused for a long moment before adding softly, "Or at least, the kind of love I'm looking for." Dean's heart slammed against his ribs and almost busted out of his chest at his last statement, but he was sure Castiel was too absorbed in thought to notice Dean's pained expression.

"You uh…" Dean sounded hoarse suddenly so he cleared his throat before continuing, "You find it yet?"

Cas smiled a sort of secret smile—as if he was laughing at some inside joke Dean could never be apart of—before shrugging and replying briskly, "Depends on who you ask."

Dean furrowed his brow, "What does that even mean?"

"Do you want me to finish the story or not?" Cas asked softly and as much as Dean wanted to know what he meant by his previous statement, he wasn't about it let this rare opportunity slip through his fingers.

"Yes," Dean said eventually after a long beat of silence, "Go on."

He saw a flash of surprise reflect in Castiel's blue eyes, as if he was still shocked that Dean still wanted to know more, before finally clearing his throat and saying, "Where was I again?"

"Amelia accepted Jimmy and everything was all puppies and rainbows." Dean answered and felt a soar of victory when he saw a small smile tugging at Cas' lips.

"Yes," Castiel recalled with a firm nod before resuming his story, "So, um…when I was finally born, my father was the one that was granted the honor of naming me."

Dean grinned, "So where'd he get the name Castiel, ?"

"No," Castiel told him with a shrug, "He named me after his favorite hallucination."

The smile dropped from Dean's face.

"Uh," The older boy sputtered out once he regain control of his mouth, "What?"

"Castiel was one of the voices my father heard in his head," Cas explained plainly, as if the whole idea didn't freak him the fuck out (or at least, that was how Dean was feeling anyway), "He was this so called 'angel ascended from heaven' that protected my father from his other internal tormentors." A corner of Castiel's lips curled into a half-smile as he added, "He told me that Castiel was the sole reason he didn't end his own life, so he felt obligated to name his one true joy after his savior."

"That's…touching, I guess." Dean said lamely because he honestly didn't know any other word to describe it.

"You don't get it," Cas snapped as he moved his gaze to stare at Dean with glassy eyes, "That's probably the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me—that I was so important and amazing that I got the honor of being named after something that meant so much to someone. For once in my life, I mattered. I mean, you may already feel accustomed to that feelings, but I usually don't get the luxury of experiencing the same sentiment."

"Cas," Dean began softly, "You matter."

Castiel snorted, "Oh yea? To who?"

To me.

"To, you know," He sputtered, rubbing the back of his neck uncomfortably, practically kicking himself for what he got himself into, "Sebastian and Meg, and maybe that even dick Gabriel…" The image of Anna staring at Castiel like she would give up the whole world for him to just look at her, "And your sister Anna seems—"

"Don't," Cas cut him off curtly, his whole body suddenly becoming rigid, "I don't have a sister named Anna." He looked to the ground suddenly, "At least…not anymore." Before Dean could even ask, Castiel cleared his throat, "Anyway, as I was saying, for the first few years of my childhood, everything was perfectly normal. I was even blessed with a new baby sister named Claire."

"Another name from your dad's head?" Dean couldn't help but ask with a cocked eyebrow.

Castiel rolled his eyes, "No. She was named after my deceased grandmother."

"Oh," Dean said, a corner of his lips turned upward, "Looks like someone got the better end of the deal."

"I don't even want to know which one of us you are referring to." Cas said but there was a ghost of a smile on his face as well.

They both stayed quiet for a moment before Dean finally took it upon himself to break the silence, "So…what caused Pandora's Box to open up?"

"Actually, in the original Greek myth, the box was really a jar," Castiel told him, as if Dean actually gave a flying shit about that, "The common misperception of being referred to as a box was just a mistranslation of the Greek word pithos, which means jar, for pyxis, which means box."

"That's amazing, Cas," Dean said sarcastically, rolling his eyes, "But I wasn't really asking for a history lesson."

"First of all, it's a mythology lesson." Castiel mumbled under his breath, which caused Dean to glare at him.

"Cas…"

"Okay, okay," Cas said lowly, rubbing his jaw, "I'll continue." He let out a long sigh, his hands clasping together and his leg began to bounce, "My father…he said he hadn't heard the voices in such a long time that he thought that maybe," He cut himself off and took in a shallow breath, "Maybe he was cured."

"So what'd he do?" He asked, getting too caught up in the story to notice Castiel's overwhelming discomfort.

"He stopped taking his medication," Castiel told him abruptly, closing his eyes as if he could just picture the painful memory, "He didn't think the voices would ever come back. He thought that God had chased them away just like he gave my father happiness when he met my mother and had us.

"He seemed fine for the first week or so," Cas said with a sagging shrug, "But then he, uh…he began to hear him again."

"Who?"

"Castiel," He answered, opening his eyes back up as they flared to life, "The angel of the Lord that told my father that he was chosen for a higher calling. He said that my father was a vessel."

"A vessel?" Dean repeated, furrowing his brow, "What, like a ship?"

"Vessels are special human beings that serve as the embodiment of spiritual, non-physical creatures," Cas explained plainly, "According to my father, every angel has a true vessel and with that human's permission, that angel can enter the body and take total control over it."

"And your father," Dean said slowly, "He believed he was what, Castiel's meat suit?"

"Yes," He confirmed, licking his lips, "But it wasn't his fault. He was mentally ill and he honestly thought he was serving God, like Abraham in the Old Testament."

"But you guys must have noticed something was off," He argued, "You must have put him back on the pills, right?"

"My mother tried, Dean," Cas said numbly, "She did everything she could—she forced the pills down his throat, but he would always vomit them back up. He didn't want to be helped, no matter how much his family was suffering."

"So what'd you do?"

"We didn't do anything, but he did." Cas told him, his teeth clenching shut, "One day, I came outside and found my father staring numbly at the sky. I-I asked him what he was doing, and you know what he said to me?" His whole body became to shake but his voice was as solid and laced with bitterness, "'I am not your father.' And then he just left, never to be seen or heard from again."

Cas put his face in his hands, letting the violent tremors wash over his body. He stayed silent like this for what seemed like hours before he raised his head up and met Dean's gaze, "That is the last thing my father said to me, Dean. How fucked up is that?"

Not being able to help himself, Dean scooted closer to him and wrapped an arm around Castiel's shoulder, squeezing gently as he said softly, "More fucked up than a giraffe giving a circus elephant a hand-job in the back of a Prius." He heard bubbling laughter erupt from Castiel and turned his head to see the blue eyed boy staring at him with a desperate but hesitant expression, as if he wanted to do something but was too scared to follow through with it.

"My mother," Cas began gently, not breaking eye-contact with Dean for even a nanosecond, "She did her best to support us after he left, but we barely got by. Some nights, we didn't even eat at all. She couldn't support two kids, Dean, and I don't blame her for what she did."

"What'd she do, Cas?" He asked almost inaudibly, fighting back against the strong gravity that was pulling him closer to the younger boy.

"She gave me up," He said hollowly, swallowing hard, "She had to choose between keeping either me or Claire, and she chose her." He shrugged casually like it was nothing, but Dean could see the hurt in his eyes when he spoke about it, "I don't blame her. I looked like my father and was named after the one thing that stole him away. I was just a painful reminder, Dean, and while my mother loved me, she couldn't keep both of us—not if she wanted to give us both the possibility of a better life."

"But you didn't get a better life," Dean stated coldly, suddenly feeling an undeserved amount of rage at Castiel's mother, no matter how pure her intentions were meant to be, "You got stuck with a terrible family in a terrible town with terrible people."

"But I met you," Cas said quietly, a corner of his lips quirking up, "That's a silver lining."

Heat plagued Dean's stomach as his heart constricted against him, causing him to become too breathless to reply. But once he did recover the ability to breathe and finally untied his tongue, Dean swallowed back the emotions that were bottling up in his throat just waiting to spill out (either that, or those "emotions" were just vomit; Dean couldn't tell) and said hoarsely, "Cas, I hate to tell you this, but I'm not the saint you make me out to be. I'm just—I'm just me."

"Exactly," Castiel replied gently, smiling softly at him as he leaned in and whispered, "When I'm with you, I forget that I don't matter. And that," He leaned in further so their faces were only an inch apart, "Is truly remarkable."

"Cas, how can you not see?" Dean demanded, sounding so breathless as if he had just ran a marathon.

"See what, Dean?" Cas asked, his minty breath hitting Dean like a powerful gust of wind.

How absolutely perfect you are.

He tried to let the words slip from his lips, but they somehow got stuck in his throat. So instead, Dean just pulled back and took in a deep breath, trying to shake the dizziness out of his head and return his rapid heart-rate to normal.

"Dean," Castiel said softly, his head cocking slightly to the side in that adorable way it always did, "Are you all right?"

Dean cleared his throat, ignoring how his thoughts screamed that he was really anything but, and blurted out, "I just need a drink, that's all."

"I apologize," Cas said and dammit, how does a person sound that freaking sincere? "I didn't bring any refreshments. I had just gotten back only an hour prior to the arranged time."

"Where'd you go?" By the dark glint that flashed through Castiel's eyes, Dean supposed that their little Q&A session was officially over.

"Gabriel and I went out," He responded stiffly before he stood up abruptly, "It is getting rather late, but I suppose that possibly some stores could be open. I could purchase a soda for you, if you'd like."

Dean chuckled as he got to his feet, "Not that kind of drink, Cas."

Castiel's forehead creased in confusion for a few moments before his face lit up in realization, "You mean an alcoholic beverage, don't you?"

"Hey, it only took you fifteen seconds to catch on this time," Dean teased with a grin, "New record."

Cas rolled his eyes, "Dean, I may be a little slow on the intake, but I recognize mockery when I hear it."

Dean shrugged and ruffled Castiel's black hair as he past him, but all walking ceased when he saw Cas wasn't following him.

"Dude, are you comin' or what?" Dean asked with a cocked eyebrow as he threw a glance at the boy over his shoulder.

Castiel looked surprised, "You want me to come with you?"

Dean rolled his eyes and let out an exasperated sigh, "No, Cas, I was talking to the bush."

"I would hope you weren't trying to kidnap any vegetation, Dean Winchester," Castiel said with a half-smile, slowly walking over to join him, "As a responsible residence in this town, it is my civic duty to turn you in if so."

"Cas, has anyone ever told you how much of a smart-ass you are?" Dean asked as he bumped his shoulder with Castiel's, slowly leading him towards the Impala.

"I've only recently turned into a 'smart-ass' upon associating with you." He informed him with a crooked grin.

"So I'm a bad influence, huh?" Dean demanded, pretending to be offended, "Funny, I always thought I was such a choir boy."

"I don't believe you're bad, Dean," Cas told him, glancing over to him, "You're just normal. And according to my family, that is bad."

"Well, they can go screw themselves," He declared proudly, "You can do whatever the hell you want, Cas." Dean shrugged and smiled at him, "Even if it means hanging out with a loser like me."

Castiel snorted, "I would hardly categorize you as a loser, Dean Winchester." He then looked at the Impala, which was just now coming into view, "Where are we going anyway?"

"To a bar," Dean answered as he casually walked out of the forest and opened the Impala's passenger door, motioning for Castiel to get in, "It's time for you to act like a normal teenage boy, Cas. And that means getting so drunk off your ass that you barely remember your own name."

Castiel grimaced but did reluctantly get into the car, "I hope you don't make me regret this."

"Don't worry, Cas," Dean told him, giving him an encouraging smile as he slammed the door shut, "I'll take care of you."

He tried to shake the expression of pure trust and adoration on Castiel's face as he got into the car and drove towards the nearest bar in Lawrence that are stupid enough to serve beer to minors.

Because maybe, just maybe, he could drink away the growing emotion that plagued his heart every time he looked at Castiel Novak.

But the real question was: Did he even want to?

Author's Note: And there you have it: the brutal and angsty past of Castiel's first loss of childhood innocence. But be warned: this isn't all the secrets Castiel is keeping from Dean; we haven't even got to his time at the Milton household yet.

Please, if you have thoughts about this chapter at all, don't be shy to drop in a review! I'd love to hear what you think about this new information and how you might just see Cas in a whole new light (I'm not discouraging follows/favorites either).

Next chapter will be about their time at the bar, so I'll let you ponder what might occur (there will be legitimate Destiel in that one...somewhat, anyway). But until next chapter!