I apologise for the amount of typos in the last instalment – clearly I was too tired.
"Castiel!" Michael strides across the arrivals hall, luggage slung over his shoulder. He looks every inch the man their father had once been, forever the golden boy of the family with his height, strong jaw and politely powerful grace. Castiel would have been envious of it had he not known Michael, as it was he was just happy to see his brother, and thoughts of comparison were far from his mind.
Castiel waves and Michael greets him with a heavy hand on his shoulder and a broad smile.
"How are you?"
"Good." Castiel feels a twinge of nerves so powerful it makes him feel sick. "Do you want to take a cab to mine?"
"Yes, if you don't mind."
Michael manages to keep Castiel elevated with small talk and easy questions about his wellbeing and the weather down here. Castiel checks his cell approximately twenty times throughout the journey, a fact which doesn't go unnoticed.
"Are you expecting a call?" Michael asks with mild interest.
"Dean and I had a fight." It hurts to say, but he has no one else to voice it to.
"I'm sorry to hear that." He leaves a careful pause. "Is everything alright?"
"Not really." Castiel grits out, watching the buildings pass the cab windows. "But...it will be." He grips the phone until it hurts, watching his knuckles turn white. He's given up everything for Dean, opened up far too much to not leave some serious scars if he's left like this.
"I hope so." Michael looks out of his own window.
They really aren't the most emotionally available family.
Michael coughs. "So...this news you wanted to tell me about..."
"When we're home." Castiel says quietly, the phone pressing a cruel line into his palm. "Just...I need to be...I need a minute."
"I understand."
"You will." He feels very tired suddenly, like the last of James left the building the minute he decided to tell everyone his secret. Now he's just Castiel again, awkward, shy and a virgin at eighteen. He can almost forget the intervening years of tricks and drunken one night stands, the lover's he's lost to his job, the clients and episodes of violence or infection.
He wishes Dean was there.
He leads Michael up the stairs with growing trepidation, knowing that he has to break into the truth somehow.
He really doesn't know what the first thing that goes through his mind is, when he sees the man on his doorstep.
"I was beginning to think you'd skipped out on me." He smiles. "Really Angel...how could you keep me waiting?" Alistair's voice is low and slick, Castiel feels the phantom burn of a dozen lash marks on his back, teeth against his throat and saliva spraying his flayed skin.
He's not a prostitute anymore. He's not taking appointments anymore. But Alistair has been to his apartment before, he knows where it is, could have been buzzed in by anyone...
But he's not thinking that, just fear, total blind fear like he felt being tied down and ripped apart. Confusion and sudden, piercing terror that THIS is how Michael is going to find out.
"Get. Out. Of. Here." He says, with as much strength and gravitas as he can dredge up. Alistair hooks a finger into his belt, unimpressed.
"But I'm paying...and really you should take it as a gracious compliment." He moves a little closer. "No one takes it quite like you."
"Castiel?" Michael has followed him up the final set of stairs and now stands frozen behind him.
"Busy then?" Alistair gives Michael the once over. "Well I do hate to share...but since you didn't answer my calls...and now this, well..." He tuts softly. Voice sing songing. "You're gonna look so pretty when I'm done marking you...my own personal angel, all opened up for me."
Castiel shudders, he can't suppress it.
"Castiel, what is this?" Michael glares at the other man like he's a combination psychotic and drunk, Alistair cocks an eyebrow.
"Hush your mouth, boy." He smiles his dangerous smile, the one Castiel has come to associate with sharp jabs in soft places, pain and humiliation. "We're all Johns here, enough of our pretty thing here to get everyone off...I'll see you Angel."
"No you won't" Castiel sounds weak, even to himself.
"You're very wrong about that." Alistair circles him, walking towards the stairs and passing too close for comfort. "and if you ignore my call again...too bad for you...and what's bad for you is usually a good time for me, as I'm sure you remember." He walked out into the stairwell without looking back.
Michael takes a second to process the scene in it's awful entirety. Castiel waits.
"Castiel...who the hell was that guy? Are you in some kind of...is he stalking you?"
"No." Castiel waits some more, watching the realisation swell between them like a wave in a septic tank, awful and unstoppable.
"He said...Johns? and..." Michael's face twists. "Was he paying you? Paying for..." He lets out a breath. "Did he pay you for sex...Castiel?" he asks falteringly.
"Can we...just get inside? Not do this in the hallway?" Castiel looks at the floor. Michael looks at him unable to erase the thought and unable to move with it weighing so heavily on his mind.
"Please Michael?" Castiel opens his front door, turning back to his brother.
"Castiel..." He doesn't move. "Castiel..." and suddenly he's there, arms wrapped so tightly around him that for a second Castiel is too stunned to respond, feeling his brother hug him tightly and bury his face in his shoulder. "Boy, what's happened to you?"
He didn't know his brother's compassion would be the thing to break him, but his eyes turn blurry and he can feel his throat thicken, tears welling up and burying themselves in the cotton of Michael's shirt.
They stand like that for what feels like an age, his brother refusing to let go, Castiel not wanting to be released. Finally Michael pulls away, picking up his discarded bag.
"I need you to explain this to me...and then I need you to forgive me."
"Michael...this wasn't your fault, how can you..."
"I'm your brother. Your older brother, point of fact, me and Luc...we're supposed to protect you, that's how it is, now that Father...now that they're both gone."
It's the most Castiel has ever heard his brother say on the subject of their parents.
"Michael, it was my choice, to leave you. My choice to live as I have." He opens the door wider. "Come inside."
Michael follows him into the apartment and Castiel leads him to the living room.
He's survived trial by fire; by rights he should feel better.
His phone remains stubbornly silent.