Cas' POV

"It's a crappy world, isn't it?"

"What?" I ask.

"Prejudice. Women, gays, Jews: pretty much everyone has put up with some sort of crap. I mean, barely anyone even knows I'm bi, and I don't hide it, I just… don't tell anyone. It's like society is trying to make me ashamed of it, but I'm not, I just don't really care that much."

"You mean you don't care what people would think about you? The countless people who would just claim you're confused, rather then accepting that it's a genuine sexuality."

He chuckles. "Well when you put it like that, yeah I suppose I do, I tend to kind of cancel out people like that from my life though. That way I don't have to put up with anything from people who do find out."

My mouth tugs to the side a little, because I love his confidence and optimism for his situation.

"Although…" he starts. "There was one school, a while back, where I met this guy. He was pretty cool, my age but Sam's friend. What was his name? …Brady! Yeah, that's it. Anyway, this one time we were at a party: we both got pretty wasted and ended up making out in an upstairs bedroom – as you do. And then this girl who I'd been flirting with a bit walks in, and we're really not doing much other then kissing, but she starts screaming her head off. Like, actually screaming. So Brady and I pull apart, but of course pretty much every person at the party hears and comes running up the stairs, probably expecting a catfight or something. Then she starts screeching about what she saw us doing, and how we were 'sinful plagues, destined for hell'. She was a bit of a nut actually. That night nothing else really happened, Brady and I went home our different ways and I guess we both just tried to forget about it until Monday." He raises his eyebrows, questioning if he should carry on with the story, and I nod my head minutely.

"When school came round I kept my head low, I hadn't made much of a statement of myself before that and I knew I was going to be out of the state before the end of the week, so there was no point trying anything on. But the next day I was using the locker room after school, and I saw Brady in his basketball kit surrounded by the rest of the team. His face was bruised and blood was leaking from somewhere. Boys shouting at him, screaming faggot and queer like they meant nothing, crowded him." He pulls a disgusted face when saying the words, and then takes a deep breathe before continuing.

"This time, I got mad. Dammit, Cas, I don't know what came over me; when I saw them doing that to Brady, for doing nothing… I flipped. It was like a James Bond movie, where I took them on one on one until I was the last one left standing."

"How the hell did you know how to do all that?"

"Ha, I don't know. I guess I just watch a lot of Bruce Lee." I snicker, and he smiles. "But yeah, at that moment I was so busy trying to let everyone know that I wasn't bothered by what they thought, that when I realized I actually did care, I just snapped."

"I get it. Like, you're so caught up in attempting not to give a crap, that you aren't aware of how much time you spend worrying about it?" I ask. Because when he said that last bit it was like he understood everything I've gone through involving this. Everything.

"Yeah Cas, exactly." Like he's suddenly remembered or noticed something, Dean grins and me.

"What?" I quiz him.

"It's just… maybe we're not as different as you seem to think."

I look away. We're too close, too comfortable with each other. We shouldn't be talking about these things, what if he tells someone? I know I'm paranoid, I know – given everything he's just told me – that I can trust Dean, but I still panic. It's what I do best.

"Maybe." I whisper.

"Anyway," The other boy spontaneously jumps to his feet. "You left your coat at Kevin's, right?" slightly startled, I nod. "Well let's go get it back."

We gather ourselves up and start walking the short distance back to the impala. I'm biting my nails, not really thinking about anything.

And then the mood drops, from neutral to deathly:

"SHIT." Dean, standing barely a meter away, shouts.

I whip my head around to him. "What is it?"

He starts raking his hand through his hair and I see the other is preoccupied with his phone, which he's staring wide-eyed at.

He looks over at me, as if he's only just registered my being there, though we were talking just a few minutes ago.

"Yeah, Cas. It's just…" He starts manically typing and then holds the phone to his ear. "It's Sammy. I've got over a dozen missed calls from him- SHIT! PICK UP YOUR GODDAMN PHONE." He yells into the mobile before it starts to go onto voicemail.

I hear a distant 'Hey it's Sam, you know what to do." And Dean takes a deep breathe before speaking.

"Hey Sammy, man, I've got like a hundred missed calls from you. What happened? I'm gonna listen to the voicemails you left me now, please just call me back, okay?" The older Winchester hangs up. "Son of a bitch you idiot Dean. Why the hell did you leave your phone on silent?" He mutters to himself.

"Dean?"

"He was calling me at 4am, Cas. 4am. Something must've happened, something really screwed up. Crap, give me a minute, Cas. Give me a decade."

Dialing for his voicemail he holds the phone to his ear, but from what I can hear there's too much noise in the background to make out what Sam's saying. Dean changes the settings to loudspeaker and I wonder if it's appropriate for me to be listening in, too late now anyway.

The first thing I hear is sobbing. Violent sobbing.

Not the kind one does after watching a sad film but the kind that pours out of somebody when they find out a loved one has died. When they break down and their legs crumple beneath them, losing the ability to even hold them up on their own two feet.

'Dean, Some- something's happened to Gabe.' Sobbing. ' He won't stop. He won't stop!' More sobbing. 'Dean!' Gasping for breath. 'Make it stop.' Sam starts choking on the words and suddenly the call is over. Dean's finger flicks to press a button and we listen to the call again. Something's happened to Gabe. My mind barely registers. I have to make it stop.

And that's it. Gabe. What won't he stop, why won't he stop? And then I realize I'm falling. Because my legs can't hold me up. And I just crumple beneath the weight of my body and the words that have been smashed into my skull. My shoulders cave in and drop to the ground with the rest of me and only a miniscule part of my brain acknowledges Dean standing away from me; hands hanging by his sides; dead green eyes staring at nothing. His face comatose and his limbs limp, he turns to my face. Not looking me in the eye, still not looking at anything, he whispers to me. "What won't he stop?"