Eleven

About a week after Brooke cooked Castiel the fancy dinner, he called her after work one evening. She'd just gotten home, and answered her cell as she closed the front door. "Hey."

"Brooke," Castiel said, and she had a flashback of every time he'd ever said her name like that on the phone, especially early on in their relationship, when he'd been gruff and short.

"Castiel," she replied, in mock-seriousness, forcing her voice down a few octaves.

He paused. "I… I'll be late coming home."

"Okay," she said, slowly. "Is everything all right?"

"Yes, of course. I just… I…" He let out a long, heavy sigh. "I'm terrible at lying to you."

"So, everything isn't all right?" Now, she was concerned.

"N-No, everything is fine! I just… I… wanted to get you a gift, and… so, I'm going to be late coming home. But I wanted it to be a surprise, and now it… won't be."

He sounded so disappointed that he'd ruined the surprise that she felt her insides melting. "Oh, Cass," she murmured. "Well, just don't tell me what it is. Then it'll still be half a surprise. And when you come home with it, I'll act like I had no idea you were getting me anything. How's that?" She grinned, though he couldn't see her.

He chuckled a little. "All right. We'll… go with that."

"And, for future reference, you're supposed to say something like, 'My boss is making me work late—isn't that terrible?' Or… 'A couple of the guys want to get drinks after work, is that okay?'"

"I'll try to remember that," he said, amused.

"Drive safe."

"I will. I love you."

"I love you, too."

…

"You got me a table?" Brooke yelled as she watched Castiel and Sam Winchester carry the long wooden dining table through the house.

"And chairs," Cass called, voice partially strained from carrying the heavy load.

"And chairs," she repeated. "Where are the chairs?"

Neither Cass nor Sam answered; they were too busy trying to carefully navigate the table through the space.

Brooke followed them, watching as they moved the table through the kitchen and into the dining room that she and Cass had never used. Most often, they forgot it was even there. There was nothing in there. Well, now there was a table, but that was all. She glanced at the table legs and thought, We'll have to get a rug or put all those little tabs on all the chair legs or the floor'll be ruined…

She followed the boys out to the car and discovered that the chairs had been strapped down to the bed of Sam's truck, with heavy plastic over them to keep them safe from the drive.

"You guys, you… didn't have to do this," she said, coming forward, wanting to help them carry the chairs in.

"I don't mind," Sam said, with a smile. "But I expect Thanksgiving at your place this year."

"Thanksgiving," she repeated, faintly, and then blinked. "You—You wanna have Thanksgiving dinner here?"

"Duh," he called over his shoulder, carrying a chair away inside the house. "You're the one with the fancy table and chairs!"

Brooke stopped Castiel halfway to the front door, pulling at his arm. Carefully, he set the chair down.

"You got me a dining table," she murmured, smiling at him.

He ducked his head. "Sam paid for half—

"You made Sam pay for half—

"I did no such thing! He offered. In exchange for Thanksgiving dinner here."

She laughed. "Of course. Well, we should invite Daphne and Peter, then, too."

Castiel nodded.

She did not mention Dean. He had not contacted any of them since Halloween and she did not want to mention his name in front of her husband for fear of opening a wound that was still too fresh.

…

Later, she stood with Castiel alone in the dining room, her arms wrapped around him, and smiled at their new table. "It looks amazing."

"I'm glad," he murmured, kissing her head.

She looked around at the rest of the room, previously empty and unused. "We'll need to get some paintings or something in here. And a rug."

He hummed in acknowledgement.

She made a face, wincing. "It wasn't… too expensive, was it?"

He pulled away from her, and went around to the opposite side of the table. "There's a little scratch here, and a couple of the legs are dinged. Sam and I alerted a salesman, so they let us have it at a discount."

Brooke nodded. "Smart."

"I'll admit, I was looking for a slightly damaged table for this reason," Castiel said. "If I hadn't found one, I probably would've gone to Goodwill, next."

"It's okay, Cass," she replied, with a smile. "I would've done the same thing. We're not… exactly rich. And I don't care if the table's scratched." She moved forward and ran her hand along the wood. "It's still beautiful."

"I think so, too." He sighed. "Even discounted, you may have to consider this your Christmas present."

She gazed at him, studied the slightly ashamed look on his face, and came over to him. "There's nothing wrong with being poor." She cupped his face in her hands.

"I know that," he said, and placed his hands over hers. "I just wish…" He took a breath. "I would give you the entire world if I could. But I can't."

"You do enough, Cass. More than enough. You always have."

"No." He looked down at her sadly. "Not always. For many years, I… cared more about myself and what I thought I needed to do than I did about you."

"I don't believe that. I believe you thought equally about both of us. Actually, you were always thinking of me first. I just… There were always more important things to be doing than going off and having our own lives." She thought back to the first time Cass had lost his Grace, when it had been ripped out by Metatron. They'd gotten a taste of a normal life, then, but it had been dragged away from them by duty.

"Regardless," Castiel said, "I… I just want to do this right. This life. This second chance. I want all of it to be… perfect."

She smiled at him lovingly, indulgently. "Nothing is ever perfect, but… we can always try."

###

(CASTIEL'S POV)

Castiel's gift to Brooke had gone over well, which lessened some tightness in his chest. Since losing the ability to read her mind, he'd found himself with this constant need to please her, but without a direction as to how to do so. It was not her fault—he did not tell her about this need inside himself—but it was there, all the same. It was quiet often enough. It was quiet when she smiled at him, when they were cuddling in bed, when he was at work and had no time to think of her. But sometimes, it was loud and bright and tight, like a migraine in his heart.

If she knew, she would tell him he should do more things for himself, that he did not need to worry about her happiness. She would tell him to find a hobby to fill more of his time. But she did not know—or at least, not the full extent of it. The guilt of keeping such a secret ate at him during the nights. He claimed he was not good at lying, and he would have liked to think he was not good at keeping secrets, either. But… If he told her, it would hurt her, and that was the last thing he ever, ever wanted to do to her.

When he woke one particular morning, a Saturday, the need was there. Sometimes, in the mornings, it was quiet. On those mornings, he stayed with her in bed for a while, and they spoke in low, gravelly, sleepy voices and held each other. But on mornings like this, he awoke with the need to get up out of bed immediately and make his wife breakfast. She was still partially asleep, so he placed a kiss on her brow, smiling at her grumbled Good morning, and slipped out of bed and out to the kitchen.

He cooked eggs and toast and cut up two apples into slices. He made coffee. He seasoned the eggs, buttered the toast, put it all onto two big plates, and began carrying the plates back into the bedroom. He'd come back for the coffee in a moment. But when he left the kitchen, there was Brooke in the living room, in her pajamas, staring up at the tapestry of names they'd created. One hand was raised up, her fingers touching a name.

Which one today? he wondered. Jack? Bobby? Meg?

Slowly, he approached her, waiting.

And then she pressed a hand to her mouth and hugged herself around the middle with her other arm, and attempted to suppress a sob.

The plates trembled in his hands. Carefully, he put them down on the coffee table, and went to her. "Brooke." He said her name as gently as he could, barely above a whisper.

She turned to him for just a moment, falling against him. And then, immediately, she turned away again, standing up straight, and went away, to the bedroom.

He stood there, rooted to the spot, the world tilting. This had never happened before. She had never rebuked his attempts at comforting her. Not for a long time. Not since he'd still been an angel and he could still understand, instantly, why she would have done it. The beginnings of panic invaded the edges of his mind, his vision blurring as he became unable to focus on anything. What had he done? What should he do now?

But, before he could have a complete panic attack, she returned to him, still crying. He halfway opened his mouth, unsure what to say to her, and then she thrust her arm out at him. He looked at it, wondering if maybe she'd hurt herself somehow. She was wearing the bracelet he'd gotten her. The bracelet that meant she was having a bad day and wanted him to take control for the day—to do everything and not to expect her help with any of it.

He took a deep, deep breath, held it, and released it very slowly. He smiled, bowing his head. Thank you, Jack, he thought—his take on the phrase Thank God, now that the world was so different.

There was no more tightness in his chest, and he seemed to settle into himself a little more, as if remembering who he was. He was filled with purpose now. This was the first time she had ever put on the bracelet, so this was the first time they would ever do this. He was a little nervous, but calm at the same time. Calm down to his bones. She needed him, so he would do his very best, limited as he was by his humanity.

"I made breakfast," he said in a light, level tone.

She nodded, sniffling, and wiped at her eyes with the heels of her hands.

"Why don't you get back into bed and get comfortable, and I'll bring in the food," he suggested. But, really, it was a command, veiled with a kind tone.

She sniffled again, then seemed to shake herself a little, and headed back to the bedroom.

He nodded at her back, once, watching her go, and then went to get the coffee. With her distraught as she was, the coffee might help to brace her a little. Grief always seemed worse when one was tired. Or, at least, it was muddled. Being awake made it sharper, but at least when one was fully awake, one could understand their grief a little more clearly.

He came into the bedroom to find her curled up, laying down, but she sat up when she saw him. Her hair was plastered to one side of her face, stuck there from the wetness of her tears. She curled her hand around her hair, pulling it away at the back of her neck until it slid away from her face, as well. Then she took his proffered mug of coffee, sipping quietly.

"I'll be right back with breakfast," he said, after watching her swallow a little more coffee. "I left it on the coffee table."

She nodded.

When he returned with the food, he sat on the edge of the bed, near her, and they ate their breakfast together. He kept one eye on her, at least, to be sure she was actually eating. She was, albeit slowly, but he did not mind that. As long as she ate, he did not care how long it took her to do so. He did note, with some relief, that the more she ate, the faster she ate, which meant the food was helping in some way. She finished her food and drank more coffee, and glanced at him with a small, wavering smile.

He reached out and touched her cheek, and warmth blossomed in his chest when she leaned into his hand. "I'll do the dishes now," he said, but she was shaking her head already.

"Stay," she whispered.

"All right." The egg would harden onto the plates and he would have to scrub harder to get it off, but that didn't matter. He lay down on his side of the bed and curled himself around her, and let her cry. He gently pulled strands of hair away from her face from behind, burying his head against her shoulder, feeling her tremble in his arms.

Truthfully, he had expected this meltdown from her months ago, but it had never come. Sometimes, she would look sad for a few minutes, or a few hours, and then she would rouse herself from it and be "normal" again. This moment, now, seemed like the breaking of a dam—all the sorrow and heartache she'd kept inside herself since Jack had changed the world.

He had already done his own crying, several times, usually after he awoke from some nightmare. Still, witnessing this from her now, he felt tears sting his eyes. He would lay in bed with her all day, tell her anything she wanted to hear, if she would be happy again.

After a long time, her crying quieted, and she turned to face him in the bed. "I woke up remembering the dining table," she said, her voice raspy. "And thinking about Thanksgiving, and… and then I realized that Jack wouldn't be able to celebrate it with us." Her face scrunched up as if she were about to cry again, but she passed a hand over it, and calmed herself. "I know he's not dead. But… he's not here. He'll never be here, ever again. He feels… d-dead. Like when I talk to him in my head, it feels like I'm talking to someone dead. It doesn't feel like I'm talking to God. Well, s-sometimes he feels like God, but sometimes…" She shook her head. "I miss him. I miss him here."

Castiel felt a tightness in his face, in his throat, behind his eyes—the verge of tears. He took a steadying breath, reminding himself that he was to be the rock today, the sturdy one, and he brought his forehead to hers, and breathed. "I miss him too. All the time. Every day. But he knows that. He sees us."

"And how often were comforted by your absent father when you were missing him, by knowing that he saw you?" Brooke snapped.

He flinched. He'd said the wrong thing.

"I'm sorry," she said, immediately. "I didn't mean…" She sighed heavily.

"I know," he murmured. "I just wish I knew… what to say to you. How to make you feel better. It was much easier, before…"

She scooted closer to him until her head was buried under his chin, against his neck and chest.

He hesitated, feeling her breath there. "C-Can you breathe?"

"No," she said, and giggled, and turned her head and took a dramatically deep breath.

He smiled.

They fell silent for a time, Brooke snuggled right up against him, and he petting her hair, running his fingers through it.

She lifted her arm and looked at the bracelet on her wrist. "How long do I get to use this?"

"As long as you wish."

She glanced up at him, grinning. "What if I never take it off again?"

He set his face in mock seriousness, pretending to think. "Well, I suppose I'd have to quit my job…"

She laughed. "Cass, I think you might be an enabler."

"Are you just realizing this now?" he asked, with what he hoped was a mischievous sort of smile.

She blinked, stared at him, and laughed again. "Well… I won't keep it on forever, but… but maybe the rest of today?" She said it as a question, peering up at him with big eyes. She might as well have batted her eyelashes at him.

He had an overwhelming urge to make love to her, just then, as he gazed down at her, with her face so close to his. But that was not his place today. "You may keep it on for as long as you wish," he repeated, softly.

She hid her face against him again, snuggling down deeper in the bed. "What else does this entail? I mean… what else would you do for me?"

"Anything you wanted."

She hummed, a discontented sound. "Can you be more specific? I can't read your mind anymore."

"Nor I yours, which would make all of this much easier," he grumbled, and took a breath. "I would… draw you a bath, if you wanted. Read to you. Take a walk, hand-in-hand. I would… lay in bed with you all day and watch Netflix, if it was what you wanted. I would make you any food you were craving, as long as we had the ingredients."

"But you'd… do all these things, anyway," she said, looking up at him again.

"Well, yes," he admitted, "if you thought to ask for them, which seems to be the problem. But my hope is that the bracelet will… free your inhibitions, and make asking for things easier. The bracelet puts us into a different… mindset. Today I am your… servant, if you will."

"I will not," she said. "You're not my servant, Cass. You've never been my servant. You're my husband. We're equals."

"Of course we are," he said, and tried to think of how to explain. "When you… want the Commander, in bed, we are still husband and wife—still equals. But we play at being master and slave. At a word, I would stop whatever we were doing and give you anything you wanted. At a glance, I would tell you were not enjoying yourself and I would change anything that needed changing. I would stop being the Commander in a heartbeat. But, as long as you wish it, I am the Commander. It is a role. It does not negate our equality." He touched her face. "It is the same here, now. Now, I play the role of the willing servant, quietly, meekly. It doesn't change my status as your husband. It does not degrade me, which I think is what you fear. I choose it."

She kissed him then, sitting up and holding his face in her hands. Her breath was warm. "The way you speak," she murmured against his mouth, after a moment. "Your speech pattern changed."

"Did it?" he asked, tangling a hand into her hair. "I had not noticed."

"You sound like an angel again," she said. "So serious."

You sound like an angel again. The words hit strangely in his chest—a warm, bittersweet ache at all the unspoken meaning behind them. She missed him in ways he could not fix. She did not mean to miss him like this. But she had known him as an angel for fifteen years—a long time to one who'd been human forever. She missed his quiet assuredness, the stillness in him that was impossible to replicate now. She missed his ability to stop breathing forever, if he wished. She missed his inhuman strength, and his ability to invade her mind and lay her soul bare before himself, to see into her until she felt raw. Most humans would have shied away from such scrutiny. Brooke had reveled in it, thrusting herself upon his consciousness and daring him to rebuke her; he never had.

These things he knew without the need for telepathy, because he missed them, too. But being an angel had also filled his life—and hers, and the Winchesters'—with pain and suffering. Every day. Every day had been fearful; exhausting. He would take his pathetic, humbling humanity if it meant safety for those he loved.

And yet, she craved all the parts of himself that he could never give her.

"Cass?"

The sound of her voice awoke him, and he focused his eyes on her to see her looking up at him in concern.

"Are you okay?" she asked. "You look… sad."

He smiled at her, touching his forehead to hers. "Just… missing my… angelness, as you would say."

"I'm sorry," she murmured, looking away. "I shouldn't have said you sounded like an angel again, like…" She swallowed. "You're enough now." She looked back at him, her gaze fierce. "Now, as human as you are. You're enough."

He loved her for those words, for thinking of his feelings always. He loved her for a million reasons, new ones added each second, and some of that tightness, that need to please her, dissipated. "I know," he said. "Thank you."

…

And so they did, in fact, spend most of the day in bed, watching Netflix, or mindless YouTube videos. Sometimes they set the laptop aside and just talked. At some point, they fell asleep, and woke a few hours later, starving.

She wanted a comfort food, and let him decide, so he heated up bowls of tomato soup and made grilled cheese, and they curled up on the loveseat in the living room to eat. The moment they were comfortable, she dipped the corner of her grilled cheese into the soup, hovering it over the bowl to be sure it would not drip, and waved it in front of his face: an offering.

He ducked his head with a small smile and took the bite, savoring the combination of flavors: the salt and fat from the cheese, the sweet tanginess of the soup. Eating was one of the great joys of being human, and he tried to remember that each time he sat down to a meal.

As they were finishing their meal, Brooke seemed to lose herself in thought, staring two at her empty plate as she chewed the last of her sandwich. "We should volunteer somewhere," she said. "Like, a soup kitchen. It's November now—Christmas is coming up—and I just thought it would be nice to get into the spirit of things."

He smiled. "I like that idea."

She nodded, and picked up her bowl, tilting it as she sipped from it without a spoon, draining the last of the soup into her mouth. She wiped at her face with a napkin, then her fingers, oily from the butter on the sandwich.

When he went to do the dishes, she trailed after him and wrapped her arms around him from behind as he stood at the sink. He felt her rest her head against his back and lean against him, and he smiled as he scrubbed the bowls and plates.

She murmured something into his shirt, but he could not hear her over the clatter of dishes and the water flowing in the sink. He turned off the tap. "Hmm?"

"A bath," she said, repeating herself. "A bath sounds nice. You mentioned, earlier, that you would draw me a bath, if I wanted one. Now I can't stop thinking about it."

He smiled again. "All right."

…

So, he drew her a bath, and she sank into it, her body disappearing beneath mountains of foamy bubbles. She closed her eyes, leaning back against the folded towel he'd placed for her head, and sighed contentedly. "You are so good to me," she murmured. Then she opened her eyes. "Do you think we'd both fit in here?"

He stepped back and studied the tub. Since this house was theirs now, they slept in the master bedroom and used the master bathroom. This tub was bigger than the one in the guest bathroom, but not by much. He placed a hand under his chin, trying to picture how their bodies might both fit. "Well… we probably could fit in there together," he said, after a few moments of study, "but I don't think we'd be comfortable."

She frowned and tsked. "What if I curl up really small in a corner?"

He sighed, resigned. "Half of you would be cold doing that, sitting up out of the water. But I will join you, since that's clearly what you want."

Immediately, her entire face brightened, breaking out into a smile, her eyes lighting up. He felt his chest swell at that look, that sheer joy. Even after fifteen years, it still sometimes amazed him how easy it was to please her, when it came down to it. And that wasn't an insult to her at all. He only wished to make her happy, and, for the most part, that was not difficult to achieve. Mostly, she wanted food or sex or his touch, to hear the sound of his voice, to gaze upon his face. She wanted to be comfortable as she slept. She wanted simple things. Money, jewelry, an expensive car—these things never really crossed her mind, except as passing fancies. If she did want for these things, she kept those wants well hidden, never voicing them.

He stripped so that he could get into the tub and could not help but notice the way she gazed at him, her eyes traveling his body. Were he still an angel, he could have kept himself physically calm at the sight of those half-lidded eyes, full of desire. But he was mortal now, only a man, and her lust was plain. Very soon, he stood before her, naked and erect. But now he was unsure. She'd taken the bracelet off before getting into the water, so as not to damage it, but he assumed she still wanted the rest of her comfort day. Somehow, in his mind, sex did not factor into today, as if he'd be taking advantage of her day of rest if he suggested anything of the sort. But now, he could not hide it. He was not ashamed, only wondering what she wanted.

She was half-smiling, and let her eyes linger on his cock for a time. Then her eyes flicked up to his face. "Later?"

He smiled a slow, burning smile. "If you wish it. I'll have to wait before getting into the tub now, though. If we're stuck pressed so tightly together and I'm already hard, it'll never go away."

She chuckled and lay back again, clearly content to wait.

It did not take long. He felt cold after only a minute or so, standing naked in the bathroom in November, and cleared his throat. When she opened her eyes, he stepped forward. She got out of the way as best she could, pressing herself into the side of the tub to give him room to step in. They ended up both laying on their sides, like sardines in a can, squished between the walls of the tub and each other. It was not exactly comfortable, but it was warm.

"Are you all right?" he asked her, unable to look at her face clearly because they were so close together.

"I'm fine. I don't mind this. We have to be careful, though, or we'll splash a bunch of water out of the tub."

He smiled. "So, no moving."

They were silent for a few long moments.

"The water feels nice," she murmured.

"Mmm." He closed his eyes, leaning the side of his head against the towel, letting the warmth of the bath seep down into his bones.

Brooke laughed. "I think my arm is going to sleep." There was a deep squeaking sound as she shifted a little in the tub, her skin rubbing against the bottom.

He smiled, ruefully. "I thought that might be a problem. We're pinning one arm underneath us like this."

"I have an idea," she began, slowly, "but I'm afraid you'll just excited again."

He opened his eyes. "Would that really bother you?"

"Well, no." She grinned. "Sit up."

They both sat up.

"I want to sit in between your legs. I just don't know if that's possible."

"Well, let's see if it is," he replied.

So, they tried. And she sat, as comfortably as she could, between his legs, which he could not spread very widely in the confines of the tub. But it was better than being packed like sardines in a can. He lay back with his head on the folded towel and pulled her back against his body.

She sighed contentedly. "This is better." And then, after a moment, she wriggled against him, humming in sensual satisfaction. "There you are. Right there. Against my ass."

"Hold still," he admonished. "You'll make it worse."

"Worse than this?"

He fell silent, only wrapping both arms around her, tightly, to still her slippery body.

She tutted. "You're no fun."

With a smirk, he ground himself against her ass—she gasped—and said, "I'm plenty fun, and you know it. Now, lay back and enjoy your bath."

She lay still, then, trailing her fingers through the bubbles, or softly along his arm, her head resting against his shoulder. After a few minutes of silence, they spoke quietly, of shared memories, of faraway dreams, of nothing important and everything that mattered.

They lay in the bath for a long time, until the water began to cool uncomfortably. Then they drained the tub and ran the shower to rid themselves of bubbles.

When they'd dried off, they went into the bedroom and Castiel began to walk to the dresser, to pick out clothes.

But Brooke got there first. She set the bracelet down on top of the dresser, beside the collar. That was where they lived, atop the dresser, easy to reach. And then she picked the collar up… and put it on, and turned to face him.

They stared at one another for a long moment. He noted the flush in her cheeks, the jut of her chin, as if she were challenging him. He held her gaze, his eyes narrowing, and lifted his head to gaze down his nose at her, lifting one eyebrow the way he knew she liked.

This was the first time she had ever put the collar on.

He took a moment, staring down at her like that from halfway across the room, to remember how to be the Commander. Then, he approached her slowly, until they stood but inches apart, until he could feel her breath on his face. Her eyes were wide, unable to keep that challenging glare in the face of his sudden emergence as the Commander. She had gone soft and shaky, not in fear, but anticipation.

He said, "On your knees… Angel Whore."

She let out the tiniest whimper of surprise and pleasure—he had not called her that in a very long time—and fell to her knees.