Chapter 61.
Castiel did not consider himself a demanding lover. He knew he had the potential to be, had he ever made his multitudinous needs known, but he was careful not to and he prided himself on being fairly low-maintenance.
Jules appreciated, he knew, the fact that he was not a helicopter boyfriend, needing to know at any moment where she was, what she was doing, with whom she was doing it. He trusted her to tell him anything he needed to know and he needed to know very little. Having gained her love, he felt no desire to seize control of her life or even to get a vote on it.
He loved her habit of sending inconsequential texts and pictures during most days. Some were sweetly flirtatious, some Bible texts, sending a message most people couldn't be bothered to look up, but they both knew the Bible well enough not to need to. Sometimes she simply sent, "Missing you." or "Love you." All of those meant the same thing to him, that he had crossed her mind and she had reached out to send a signal that she loved him. Even a quick snap of her lunch told him that she knew he cared whether she ate.
This was the first day in a long time with no text or call from her. He knew she was trying to give him space to deal with the Dean situation, but he also knew that she, aware of how cut-off from Dean he felt, would usually have sent some brief, supportive message. He had no reason to think it, because they had parted on more than affectionate terms and being truly naked together for the first time had not led to any of the disappointments he had feared she might feel, but something in his gut told him that something was wrong.
He checked his phone, wondering if some technical fault had worried him for nothing.
Dean noticed immediately. "What's wrong, Cas?" he said.
"Jules." said Cas.
"What does she say?" said Dean.
"Nothing. Nothing for hours now."
"Did you guys argue?" said Sam.
"No. We had a wonderful morning."
Dean nodded. "It's okay, Cas. Go to her."
"It's probably nothing." said Cas, "You know me and subtext."
"Yeah, you're right. You're probably worrying about nothing. Go anyway, because she'd rather have you ask than go on worrying."
"But I'm supposed to be here, with you." said Cas.
Dean's smile was completely Dean and that alone made his heart soar. "You're a good friend, Cas." he said, "Having you around me today was just like old times. Seriously, it felt good. And I have to thank you for that, for being my friend when I've been at my least likeable, but you don't owe me anything and where you need to be right now is with Jules, so go."
"Thanks." said Cas. He hurried to their room and knocked on the door.
Paul was passing. "She's not there. She was working a case."
"What case?" said Cas. She had not been working one earlier.
"I don't know. She was checking public records on her phone. Last I saw, she was heading to the garage."
"She's gone out?" said Cas.
"Not that I know of. She likes to sit in the Jeep to think. Don't look so worried. She's fine. She's always fine."
The words, "She's always fine." chilled his heart. Paul would not have said it unless he thought there might be reason to worry and everyone saw Jules as calm, strong and undamaged by what she had been through because she, like the Winchesters ... like every damn hunter in both worlds ... buried her pain and battled on. When Paul said, "She's fine." he spoke as a hunter. It meant, "She will control her feelings and go on fighting."
He almost ran to the garage. She was in the driver's seat of the Jeep. Tears were streaming down her face. He went to the door. "Can we talk?" he said.
She wiped away some tears and opened the window. "Go back to Dean. I need to get myself together first."
"Not on my account." he said. He went to the other door and got in beside her. "What's happened?" he said.
She sighed. "I did a dumb thing."
He smiled. "Well, it was your turn."
A faint smile briefly tilted the corners of her mouth.
"Tell me." he said.
"I can't stop thinking about Stephen ... how he died, how little trace of him was left in my world. Nineteen years of life and not a thing left behind to remind anyone he was there." She stopped talking, sobs choking off her words.
Cas stroked her cheek, hot under the coolness of her tears, and waited for her to be able to speak again. Hunters, like deer, required patience and were likely to bolt if they felt close to being cornered.
"I don't have a picture of him. Not one lousy, torn photo. So I thought, my dad exists here. If I looked for Stephen in this world, I might find a picture I can keep in memory of my Stephen."
"You know that neither your father nor your brother are the same people in this world?" said Cas gently.
"I know. DNA identical, but more like twins than the same people. I just wanted to see his face ... or a face that looked like his."
"I understand." said Cas. Jules had helped him to assemble the pictures on his phone and he cherished them all. Even Claire occasionally sent him one, usually showing off some new weapon and he would barely see the knife or gun, because his eyes looked always at her eyes or her smile and he felt like a proud father, though he was careful never to sound like one. "Did you find a picture?" he said.
"No." she said and the single syllable bore a weight and a sorrow it was never intended to carry.
"What happened?" he said.
"In this world, he ... " She slumped forward, overcome by sobs again.
He put his hand on her shoulder, wishing he knew what to do or say to ease her pain.
Slowly and painfully, she choked back the sobs, straightened up and then said, in a voice most unlike her usual calm tones, "He was never born here. He never existed. Here, my parents ... I know they aren't my parents ... but here, they had one child, Juliette, who died young."
"I'm sorry," said Cas, "For them and for you."
"My dad's alone here." she said, "He has no-one."
"You should have no contact with him." said Cas, aware of how irrational humans could be with even a simulation of family involved.
"I know." she said.
"But if you like, I could check on him, discreetly make sure that he has what he needs."
She grabbed his hand. "My angel!" she said, "Thanks! That would be so good of you."
He knew it wouldn't fix anything, how could it? The non-existence of her brother in this world must feel like losing him again and for the other off-worlders who had counterparts in this reality, there was some comfort in the idea that their other selves and other families had been spared the pain they had experienced. For her family, this world had been more cruel than her own. It held no comfort at all, but the weak, conditional, uncertain love of a low grade angel.
"I wish ... " he said. He looked into her eyes, flooded with tears, bright with the pain she had hidden from everyone. "I wish I could help. I wish I could take this pain away."
"You could." she said, "You could take all memory of him away."
"I can't do that." he said, "I won't."
"Good." she said, "Because the pain is better than losing the memory of my family as it was."
"Even if you begged me, I would never do it. I wiped Dean from the memories of Lisa and Ben and it was the most terrible thing I ever did. Well, that and Jimmy and Claire and Balthazar and Charlie."
"Guilt loop!" said Jules.
He smiled. "Even now, you're protecting an invulnerable celestial being."
"You were never invulnerable," she said, "And there's no point in pretending you are to me."
"Maybe I'll stop pretending, if you will." he said.
"My act isn't going too well right now, is it?" she said, "And I think I've ruined our big romantic plans. I'm sorry, Cas. I'm a terrible girlfriend."
"Tonight, we may possibly have had sex." he said, "Or, more likely, one or both of us would have lost our nerve and wasted our chance."
"Always the optimist!" she said.
"I know my failings very well. When I say one or both of us, I mostly mean me."
"One or both was right." she said.
"Instead, we have this terrible situation."
"I know. I'm sorry." said Jules.
"Where you let me see the scars on your soul."
"I never intended to." she said.
"No, none of us ever do. We keep our silence and hide the pain and we think that means it doesn't exist. And it never works. We even tell each other it doesn't work. We beg each other not to be so stupid, because we're all so wise where other people's sorrow is concerned."
"I decided, when I left that world, I would leave its sorrows. My brother is dead. Even the world he knew is barely alive. I wanted to make a fresh start, but letting go is hard."
"Letting go is impossible, because love doesn't stop." he said.
"I need to bury the grief again. It worked for years, it can work again."
"Sarah would say you need to process it."
"That works better for peas than pain."
"Sarah knows the human heart better than I ever will." he said, "She even gets the angel heart."
"Well, my angel's heart seems pretty human to me." she said.
Some other thread of his thoughts reminded him of something. It was a doubtful suggestion, because she and all those from her world had good reason to fear angelic interference, but she had allowed him to heal her and to put her to sleep, so he decided to suggest it.
"I may be able to help with the picture thing." he said.
"There are no pictures of him in this world and we can't get back to the other one yet."
"I can draw anything I've seen. It's a big thing to ask, a matter of trust and I will not be offended if you tell me to keep my celestial snooping away from you."
"You won't be offended if I use those exact words?"
"Compared to what Dean's been saying recently, that's nothing."
"I would never use those words." she said.
"Just give me consent to glance at your surface thoughts and think of him. I can draw him for you."
"In my thoughts, my memories of him are fading." she said, sounding almost ashamed.
"That won't make a difference. It's hard to explain, but if you can give me any image, however imperfect, I can mine the raw data from which that image sprang."
"Why didn't you tell me you can draw?" she said.
"I can't. Not in the human sense. It's purely functional. Every angel can perfectly reproduce anything they have seen. There is no artistry or imagination involved. Ironically, we contain none of the divine spark of creativity that comes with a human soul."
"Darling, I've experienced your artistry in bed, you are selling yourself short." she said.