Cas can't help but feel a touch guilty as he hunts for his phone, doing his best to ignore the background noise of Crowley's inane chatter. It's already dark, shadows falling long and deep across the area, but he hasn't had the time or space to make his promised call to Dean and it makes the whole situation feel uncomfortably close to his and Crowley's attempts to open the gate to Purgatory. Cas dials the number quickly in an effort to assuage that with complete transparency.

It rings once, twice, on until it goes to voicemail. This is Dean's other, other cell, so you must know what to do.

Cas fights a flare of worry - Dean usually answers well-nigh immediately, and it's a very rare day where it takes more than a ring or two - and redials. This is Dean's other, othe-

Again. This is D-

He switches over to the messages app with minimal fumbling. It's a matter of moments before he's firing off a text. Are you awake?, he asks. And then he waits, watching as the symbol almost immediately switches over to "received", as the three dots appear, disappear, and reappear.

Eventually, the answer comes through. Yeah. What's up?

Cas pulls the phone back up to his ear, pushes the call button again. It rings. This i- He hangs up. I tried to call, he sends.

I know. A moment of appearing-disappearing-reappearing dots, and then, Sorry.

It's obvious that something not-normal is going on, and the earlier flare of concern sharpens further. Is everything okay?

The message sits on received for a good five minutes before the answer comes, but when it does, it's quick, without hesitation. All good on the homefront. Nothing to worry about.

It's a blatant lie, and Cas can still see the letters in his mind's eye as he switches back to the phone app to dial Sam.

This time, it barely rings at all before it's answered, "What?" coming over the line, tinny but familiar.

"Sam."

Something rustles on the other end, and Cas can hear the other man relax. "Oh, hey, Cas." There's something too relieved in his voice, something more than the usual companionability that fills their conversations. "Glad you called, man. Listen-"

"What's wrong?" If it were any other time, Cas might feel bad for interrupting; as it is, the worry in his stomach is sharp and twisting, and he finds himself quite incapable of focusing. "What happened?"

Sam chuckles, but it's devoid of any actual joviality. "Of course you know." Another rustle, and the clank of something else in the background. "You talk to Dean?"

"He won't answer my calls, but he texted to say everything is fine. What's going on?"

Cas can make out a murmur of something like freaky under Sam's breath before he exhales heavily, the rush crackling against the speaker. "She's gone." He pauses a moment before clarifying - "Mom." - and then amends further: "Mary."

For a horrible, sickening second, Cas envisions a too-large number of scenarios: a hunt gone wrong, a car crash, an accident, murder, British Men of Letters, anything. Distantly, he wonders why he hadn't felt her soul float Heavenward, but he's too busy inquiring for more information to dwell on that. "How did she-"

Sam snorts, bitter. "She's not dead, Cas." Another clang in the background, and Cas wonders what's going on. "She left."

Somehow, the sickening sensation gets worse. "Left?"

"Yeah." Sam breathes out again, then pauses, swallows. The clank sounds again, and, this time, Cas recognizes it as a beer bottle being set down. "She misses her sons. Her home."

"Sam…" Cas isn't quite sure what to say - the younger Winchester brother has never made quite as much sense as the elder - and he trails off, looking for something to say.

"I'm good, Cas. Don't worry about it."

"Sam." Thankfully, that's all he really has to say; he's learned enough about tone to know precisely how to convey disbelief in one word.

"Okay, fine, but I will be. I didn't… I didn't really know her. Dean didn't believe me either, but…." A moment passes when he shifts, and Cas thinks he hears a shrug pass over the line. "I don't know how to say it, Cas, but it didn't feel real. Dean has the memories of her to anchor it all too, but to me… I didn't get to know her that well before she left, so it just kinda feels like a photograph came to life. There's the disappointment of a lost opportunity, and I wish it had worked out differently, but I have faith that she'll come back. And, if she doesn't… If she doesn't, I won't have lost anything."

He sounds honest enough that Cas doesn't push further. Things are shaky enough as it is, the Lucifer debacle still hanging fresh in the air even before Mary's departure, and Cas doesn't know how to address the complicated messes that are the Winchesters' lives. He nods. "I'm sorry nonetheless."

Sam laughs, and it seems mostly genuine too. "Thanks, man. It sucks. Which is actually why I'm glad you're called… I'm worried. Dean's not doing great."

Cas was expecting it, but hearing the words is somehow different from just knowing in a way that he's somehow still surprised to register. "Where is he?"

"He was in the kitchen earlier, but he's in his room now. It's not good, Cas." A lot of things could be said about Sam - in general, over the past few years, and anywhere in between - but there was no denying the concern in his tone as he said those words. "I tried to talk to him, and I think he needs to talk about it, but he doesn't want to. And he's certainly not going to talk to me about it because he doesn't believe me when I say I'm fine and… well. You know Dean."

Cas nods. It's a point of personal significance, in fact, and his tone is solemn as he says, "I do."

"Any chance you can get over here and just… talk to him or something? I know you're on your hunt and all, and dealing with Lucifer is a big deal, so I get it if you can't, but-"

Cas is already heading to his vehicle when he cuts in, the door shut behind him as he gets through saying, "I'm on my way."

"Thanks, Cas," Sam says. "I appreciate it. I'd have called but… well, he said not to."

Cas stops. "He did?" It's a sobering sentence, and he stills in his seat, halfway to starting the engine, because he can't help but wonder if it'd be an even worse move to invade the bunker if Dean didn't want him there. He said not to, he said not to, he said not to. "Did he say why?" He tries not to sound like the question matters too much, tries not to bias Sam's answer, but the concept of emotion somehow continues to be alien even after all these years, so he might miss the mark. Besides, it's difficult when that's the sentence running through his head. It's even more difficult when he can fill in the blanks himself, can assemble a patchwork of Leviathans, Purgatory, Naomi, tablet, Metatron, Lucifer, can imagine Sam dropping the harshness of he doesn't trust you over the phone line, implied or even outright stated.

Instead, Sam just sighs. "Look, Cas: I know you've got your… bond thing… and I don't really know how it works, but I know my brother, and…" He sighed, trailing off, the sound of him scrubbing his hand across his face passing through the tinny speaker. "Mom leaving hit him hard. And Dean's version of adjusting is internalizing everything he possibly can until he can't anymore."

"Sam." Still sitting halfway through the process of getting out on the road, Cas doesn't have patience for philosophizing. (And it doesn't help that one doesn't have to be Dean's brother to recognize his rather unfortunate coping mechanisms.) "What did he say?"

Another sigh, and Cas fights a flare of annoyance at the delay. "He said not to waste your time or mine on calling. Especially not since you're hunting Lucifer." His voice somehow manages to turn even more serious. "But, to be clear, he's just overcorrecting. It's not that he doesn't want you here. I mean, don't hold your breath on him actually saying that, but he just…" Another sigh. "Didn't want to impose, I guess."

And Sam might have meant that as consolation, but that might just make things worse. Cas isn't sure what to say to that, too caught up in the implications of not to waste your time or mine on calling, on the unfortunate accuracy of overcorrecting when applied to Dean and the worrisome face that he didn't want to impose. The meaning trapped behind those layers is one that Cas doesn't like - doesn't want to contemplate - and one that he'll have to correct as soon as possible.

He starts the car.

Sam's still talking when he tunes back in. "…ou're always welcome in the Bunker, Cas. You'll probably never catch him saying it, but I know that Dean still feels guilty about what happened during the, uh, Gadreel thing, so I'll say it for him: you're never not welcome, okay?"

It's a nice effort, and Cas appreciates it, but he's already well aware. Even if Sam were right and Dean hadn't outright apologized (once with Gadreel-possessed-Sam screaming in the background, and then a surprisingly large number of times after that), it had been written in so many looks and gestures and implications that Cas just knew. He still nods. "Thank you, Sam."

"Yeah." A moment of awkward silence. "You too. Thanks for coming."

The silence draws on, and Cas finds himself back in uncertain territory. He's not sure how to leave the conversation, but the rush of static from the other end of the phone is at precisely the wrong dynamic: simultaneously too loud to be comfortable and too quiet to cover up any attempt at starting to drive that he might undertake. "I should go." Sam doesn't say anything. "Unless there's something more?"

Sam inhales sharply. "Right, yes, sorry. Nah, you're good. Just spaced out, you know?"

Cas nods. "I understand." (He does not understand.)

"I'll let you go. Thanks again."

The phone disconnects. Cas starts the engine.

— — —

It's on the morning side of nighttime when Cas finally reaches the bunker and crosses the threshold, the heavy iron door swinging shut behind him. The place is quiet - quieter, somehow, even than it'd usually be at that time of night - and there's a heaviness to the air that he can't quite explain.

Walking down the steps brings him face to face with Sam, sitting on the floor at the base of the stairs with his back to the wall and a beer in his hand. (It's just one beer - certainly not the copious quantities of empty bottles that would likely surround his brother - but the fact that Sam has a beer is worrisome enough.) "Hey, Cas." He gestured, an easy gesture towards the bedrooms with his beer bottle. "Dean's still in there."

Cas nods. "Thank you." He doesn't move.

Sam blinks up at him. "You gonna…" He gestures futilely, no meaning conveyed beyond a vague ushering towards the hallway. "Go do your thing?"

"Yes." He wants to. He can feel the negativity pervading the bunker - especially one particular bedroom - and everything in him is shouting to go make sure Dean's alright… but he can't. Not yet. "Shortly."

Confusion flickers in hazel eyes, in the patch of skin just above the eyebrows. "Uh, okay." Then, he asks, "Everything… everything okay?"

Cas nods. "Yes." He pauses for a second, sorting through his thoughts. "And with you?"

A nonchalant flexion of Sam's wrist brushes away the concern. "I'm good, Cas. We talked about this."

They had. And part of Cas - the selfish part - wants to accept the out and walk down that hallway. He doesn't, though. (He's not fully sure what stops him, how much of it is his own care for the younger Winchester and how much is the fact that Dean passed on the mantle of protect Sammy when he thought he was walking headfirst into death and never quite took it back. Eventually, he decides it must be both.) "Yes."

Sam shrugs, and Cas can see it this time instead of having to infer it from the rustle of cloth through a speaker. It's tightly controlled, straddling the line between disingenuous and real, and he's not quite sure how to read it. "Well, I mean, that's it, so… I'm good, Cas, seriously."

And Cas believes that, to some degree. But he can't leave Sam like this with just his word. Can't leave him to sit there alone, waiting by the door for a mother who isn't coming back any time soon (if at all). Instead, Cas merely walks over, sinking down next to him. Distantly, he wishes he'd taken up his trench coat again instead of potentially damaging his suit, but he hadn't bothered to put it back on after his brief stint as Agent Beyonce. It doesn't really matter, of course - he can always mend the cloth, or obtain a new one - so he pushes the thought away and refocuses. "Have you slept?"

Sam snorts, draining the last of his beer in one swallow. "An hour. Maybe. Couldn't sleep." He gestures towards the library, the open laptop just visible on the table. "Can't find a hunt, either." His fingernail clinks against the beer bottle. "Decided to give Dean's method a try."

Cas nods. "Did it help?"

A surprisingly genuine laugh bursts its way free from Sam's chest. "No."

Sam looks tired - dark circles ringing red eyes that keep trying to close before being snapped back open, hair far more mussed than Sam in his right mind would ever let it be - and Cas asks, "Perhaps you could sleep now? Particularly with the presence of depressants in your system, you might find it easier to rest?"

The laugh has faded, but it's still present in an uptick at the corners of Sam's mouth. It lifts further. "Only you, Cas." Some of Cas' confusion must have shown on his expression because Sam shakes his head, hand waving it away again. "Eh, nothing, don't worry about it. But yeah, I'll give it a shot." Sam labors to his feet; Cas stands up, too. "Thanks, man."

Cas nods. "Of course."

Sam heads towards his room, opening the door and making to head inside. Cas follows - he feels compelled to ensure that Sam is settled before anything else - but is stopped by a shaken head and a hand gently blocking his way. "I'm good, Cas. You already helped me, okay? Go help my brother, man. He needs it-" He pauses, smiles. "you more than I do."

Cas nods. "I'll do my best."

The corner of Sam's mouth twitches. "Good luck." The door closes.

— — —

Cas hovers in the hallway for a while - five minutes? ten? - before knocking on Dean's door. Part of him is worried about what he'll find on the other side. Part of him is worried that he won't be allowed to stay, to help. (He's sure beyond a shadow of a doubt that, for some reason, he's been lucky enough to have an open invitation to the bunker. That, for some reason, Dean actively wants him there. That, for some reason, all of his mistakes have been forgiven and he's still trusted, incredible though it may seem. But he also knows that Dean is a master of shutting down emotion - of not showing weakness - and it'd be all too easy for the man to shut Cas out just as much as he's done Sam, to try and protect them both regardless of the costs to himself.)

When he does knock, it's a vaguely tentative thing. Three raps of knuckles against wood, quiet enough that he's not sure Dean hears it.

He tries again, and, this time, a response wends its way out, muffled by the door but audible. "Go away, Sam." He sounds tired, too, weary in a way that tugs at that worried feeling in Cas' stomach.

Cas knocks again.

The door opens, almost before he finishes knocking, and Dean's speaking even before that. "Dammit, Sam, I said-" He stops once the door opens sufficiently, once he sees Cas. "Oh. You're not Sam."

The situation has not improved itself, but Cas smiles anyway. "No."

The door is still open, and it shows no indication of being closed. "Sorry," Dean adds. "Everything okay, Cas?"

"I-" He stops. He isn't sure what to say, honestly, given the givens. Nothing had happened to him, but saying yes would discount the worry still churning in his gut, the concern leaving his fingers twitching in an effort to do something to help. (And him saying yes had caused them enough trouble of late, that he didn't want to cause still more trouble with the same three-letter phrase.)

He supposes, though, that he should have known better than to hesitate. "Cas? Are y-" And then the words shut off, and Cas can see Dean's eyes fixing onto the blue of his suit, can see the thoughts running through his head as something halfway between weary and wary slips into his eyes. He watches as Dean quells an instinctive step back, staying firmly in place. "You are Cas, right?"

Cas nods sharply. "Yes." It takes him a second more to connect Dean's expression to his clothing, to register the sheer abnormality of the missing trench coat and everything that might mean. "It seemed wise to abandon my coat to don the guise of an FBI agent. My apologies for the confusion."

Dean nods. It's slow, a touch more hesitant than usual, and Cas can't tell if it's a result of Lucifer's echoes or everything else that's happened. Both, probably. "How goes the hunt for Lucifer?" Dean's still standing too still to be normal, and Cas files that away as he answers.

"It goes… well." Complicated, he wants to say but doesn't. That explanation is a distraction they very much don't need yet. "It will keep."

A noise sounds from down the hall. It's Sam, Cas thinks, bustling around in his room, and he wonders if he should have waited for him to go to sleep before visiting Dean. However, what's done is done, and the noise seems to remind Dean that they're still standing in the doorway. The odd stillness surrounding him dissipates with a jolt of recognition and a sweep of his arm. "You gonna come in or what, man?"

The flare of relief that results is strong enough that it almost drowns out the flare of something's wrong still eating its way through him. He smiles. Steps inside. "Thank you, Dean."

"You want the door open, or…?" He trails off, still hovering vaguely by the door. He's holding it tightly, knuckles tinged white, a hesitancy about him that's as out of character as his earlier stillness. (To be fair, though, even the offer itself is unusual to the extreme, and Cas is unnerved more by the door not gently clicking shut behind him than he would be by the closed door.) "I can leave it? If you want?"

Cas sees it, then. (He's not quite sure how he's missed it up to that point, but once he sees it, he can't unsee it.) The way Dean won't quite look at him. The way his eyes hit the floor, the wall, anything else. The expression in his eyes, something like dread shuttered behind something like uncaring nonchalance. And Cas hears that damn word from earlier repeat - overcorrecting - a resounding echo in his head.

And he understands. "There's no need," he says.

Dean nods as if he accepts it. He doesn't move as if he accepts it. (If anything, his grip on the door tightens a bit as he inhales.) "Yeah, but…" He shrugs. "Ain't about need." The shade of white lightens further, and Cas wonders if he's making up the sound of the door's wood creaking. "Leaving it open ain't gonna hurt anything. And you've got your Lucifer thing going on, so you're probably gonna want to head out pretty soon, yeah? Quickly, too. So, you know…" He shifts. (The door definitely creaks this time.) "The offer's there."

Cas nods. "Thank you, Dean." He watches for a second, checks to see… and yes, there's an expression of resigned acceptance flickering there, half-submerged beneath a mask. It's a little like disappointment except for the fact that it somehow manages to be worse. (Disappointment is predicated on a starting point of hope, Cas muses, and he's not sure that particular emotion has been around for a while now. Definitely not over the past few hours.) "But there's no need."

Dean looks over. The disappointment is supplanted by surprise; the acceptance by confusion. Then, he frowns. "It's not a big d-"

Cas can hear the end of that sentence, but he doesn't let it get said. (And he doesn't let it get said? One of the two.) Instead, he summons all the emphasis he can manage, pouring it out into, "Lucifer can wait. I'm not leaving."

For a second, he worries that he's been too heavy-handed. That he might have pushed too far. Dean's expression still has that faint confusion, but there's an edge of something else beneath it that disappears before Cas can translate it.

And then it becomes abundantly clear that no, actually, Cas hadn't been too heavy-handed. Rather, he apparently hadn't been heavy-handed enough. "Yeah, but-"

"Dean." In a matter of strides, Cas stands by the door, gently removing Dean's fingers from their death grip around it before firmly pressing it closed. The usual gentle click is replaced by a sharp snap. "There's no need for it to be open."

Dean shrugs. Cas doesn't think he's making up the way Dean's shoulders have relaxed, the way the motion is more relieved than it has any right to be. Cas doesn't address the way Dean turns away, still not looking directly at him. "Sure, Cas." A gesture that pretends at carelessness. (Cas isn't sure whom Dean is trying to convince.) "As you wish."

They stand there for a minute.

Two.

The silence draws on - not quite awkward, not quite comfortable, but some vaguely intimate place between the two - and Cas doesn't want to break it. He can't deny that he's still worried, but pursuing that is just going to make things worse before they get better, and this? This is the calm before the storm.

Literally so, because things have fallen back into that stillness from earlier. Cas, of course, is merely standing there, and Dean… Dean's somewhere in his head, eyes staring vaguely into middle space as the tension returns to his shoulders. Cas can - perhaps Cas should - use the time to look around and get a lay of the land, but he doesn't. He just waits.

Some time north of a minute and south of ten - Cas could know the value down to the millisecond, but he ignores his built-in atomic clock in favor of the human side of timekeeping - Dean pulls himself out of his head. Cas is watching this time and he sees it from start to finish; Cas is watching this time, and he thinks he understands.

When Cas first came down to Earth, he hadn't been sure what he was doing. He had a basic sense - he'd seen people performing routines of Normal Actions - but he'd lacked the understanding of why. He hadn't yet learned why it was self-explanatory that, after saying hello, one proffered one's hand to shake. Or why that was directly followed with an introduction. He'd learned the steps, yes, but not how they connected, not how one flowed seamlessly into the other until it just became automatic. He'd relied on rote memorization, like an actor playing a part from a script that hadn't yet been learned.

Watching Dean now, he sees the same thing. Sees that Dean's operating according to a routine of normalcy - step one: open door; step two: invite inside; step three… - that has lost the threads connecting one step to the next. That he's having to stop, to think about what the next step would be, to select the "right" option from a drop-down menu of possible actions, not the genuine one.

He sees it in the rigid way Dean gestures towards the bed, the way he snaps into action with a too-sharp wave towards the bed and a natural-seeming, "You gonna sit down? Or are you just gonna hover there?"

Cas smiles. It's small, but still somewhat genuine. "Of course." He moves over to the indicated part of the bed. When he sits, he thinks he sees a small smile playing about Dean's lips… but it's gone by the time he refocuses, by the time he registers that Dean's still standing awkwardly to one side. Unsure isn't a word Cas usually associates with Dean, but it's the one being shouted in his head right now. "You'll do the same, of course?"

Dean looks over at him. "I'm fine."

Cas is pretty certain that he'll be hearing those two words rather a lot this conversation. "Sit, Dean." He indicates another section of the bed. "If you please."

Dean shrugs. Nods hesitantly. "Sure, man, whatever."

When he sits, it's next to Cas. There's a slight distance between them, but they're close enough that Cas can feel heat radiating into his right shoulder, that his suit brushes against Dean's jacket every few seconds. (Cas spares an errant thought for the concept of personal space. Wonders if sitting with shoulders pressed together breaches its rather abstract boundaries. Wonders whether the proximity is because Dean wants it that way or because the foot of the bed is too small for another arrangement. Eventually, he decides that it doesn't much matter. He's not going anywhere if he can help it.)

They sit in silence for a few seconds. Eventually, Dean breaks it. "How goes the Lucifer thing?"

Cas fights a smile. It's not the time for smiles, not when he's still so, so concerned, but he still has to work at keeping one off his face. "You asked me that already."

Dean nods. Nudges Cas gently with an elbow. "You never answered."

"It goes well." He doesn't bother waiting before continuing on; Dean would just interrupt, try to deflect. "And you? How are 'things'?" He's learned not to use air quotes there, but he can tell the emphasis is wrong from the way Dean half-smiles again.

The smile drops off once the question registers. "Told you, Cas. We're fine. Everything's good."

"Dean."

"We just got back from a hunt. A rough one. Kids." A brief pause, and Cas somehow knows that that part of the story was true. "But nah, you don't have to worry. You've got bigger things on your plate."

Cas wonders if Dean recognizes that his sentences aren't flowing properly. That one word contradicts the next. That he might be able to convince someone else, but he'd not be able to convince Cas even if Sam hadn't told him what happened. "Dean."

"I'm fine, Cas." The pretense is slipping, though, and Cas thinks they both know it. Dean's shoulder is tense where it presses into Cas'. He's smiling, but it doesn't reach his eyes. "Seriously, man, you worry too much."

Cas takes a moment to look around the room. It looks… oddly pristine. Everything - the weapons on the wall, the bed, the desk, everything - looks perfectly in place. Nothing's broken, save for a dismantled EMF meter that has been shorting out lately and is waiting for Dean to repair it. A bottle of vodka, half-empty, sits on the bedside table, condensation beading on the side, but everything else? Is normal.

In some ways, it's relieving. In others, it's vaguely terrifying.

Cas stares at the bottle on the nightstand, trying to assess how the volume had been displaced. He gets five minutes into the process - and to a 99% certainty level that it had already been partly empty, that Dean had only (only) had about a quarter of the bottle at most - before he remembers that he can just look at Dean and know.

He doesn't need to, even though he does it anyway. He already knows that Dean isn't drunk - that this is Dean grieving, in pain, lost… but not drunk - and that the fact that the cap's already on, the bottle's already discarded halfway across the room, is a good thing. (When he does look, he registers that there's whiskey present, too, molecules of both types of alcohol floating through Dean's bloodstream, and yet somehow not catching up with his unfortunately high tolerance. Cas doesn't know if he's more or less worried after.)

"I don't think I do," Cas settles on, finally. "How are you, Dean?"

Dean leans a little closer, voice descending firmly into teasing territory. "You asked me that already."

Cas nods. "You never answered."

It's the right thing to say, and yet simultaneously the wrong one. Dean huffs out a sigh, scrubbing a hand over his face. "Sam called you. Didn't he?"

"No." Cas shakes his head firmly. "I called him."

"But he told you."

Cas nods. "He's worried."

Dean shakes his head. It's almost a normal motion, except for the fact that it's not. He's still looking down - at the floor, maybe, or at his hands as they hang loosely in his lap - and refusing to meet Cas' eyes. The first thing he says is muttered under his breath, stupid exhaled in a breath. (Cas isn't sure if it's directed inwards or outwards, but he doesn't like it either way.) "I'm fine."

"Dean."

"I'm fine." He's not fine. He's going through the motions - the mask is up, the tone light save for the frustration bleeding into it, the expression light - but the routine is forsaking him. The mask is cracking, and Cas can see the marionette wires holding up the tone, keeping the facial expressions right and normal instead of real, and those wires are fraying.

"Your mother-"

"I know. I know, okay?" Dean tenses like he wants to stand, but he doesn't. In a selfish way, Cas is glad for it. "'She needs her space.' 'She needs to adjust.'" Cas can hear the quotation marks; for the first time, he gets what Dean means about not needing the physical gestures to convey the meaning. Somehow, that seems like a very not-pressing issue. "She left Heaven for a shitty knock-off on Earth. Why would she stay?"

Cas knows it's not a real question. He's not sure how to answer it anyway. "Heaven can't-"

"Heaven can't give her anything new? That what you're gonna say?" Cas nods, vaguely surprised. It takes him aback, sometimes, how well Dean knows him. It shouldn't, perhaps, but it does. "Well, she's perfectly freaking fine with a- a stale memory, then, and that makes it worse." His voice breaks on the final word, one syllable divided into jagged-edged two.

One of Cas' hands clenches without him telling it to. He doesn't stop it. "She actually said that?" Part of him hopes that Dean will say no. That he'd just made it up, assumed the worst as he often does. Part of him is unfortunately confident that's a delusional hope to have. He remembers Sam saying something along those lines - She misses her sons. Her home. - but he's been assuming (hoping) that she hadn't been so cruel as to say it outright.

Dean nods. "Yup."

Cas' stomach sinks. "Oh."

Dean nods again, the skin around his mouth tightening into a bitter grimace. "Yup," he repeats. Cas can see him look towards the alcohol still sitting on the table, and he expects Dean to stand, to go grab it, to take a swig from it and then sink back onto the bed. Instead, Dean just sits there. (Cas takes a moment to wonder what's holding Dean back from losing himself in the complete oblivion that Cas is sure calls to him. Then he decides not to question what seems to be a good thing.)

"I'm sorry."

Dean shrugs. "It's fine."

Cas shakes his head swiftly. "It's not."

The moment draws on. Cas can tell that Dean remains unconvinced, but he doesn't move, doesn't speak. Neither of them do.

Eventually, Dean asks, "You talked to Sam, right?" Cas nods. "He pissed?"

The memory of Sam sprawled out in the hallway, beer in hand and expression vaguely north of devastated, rises to the front of Cas' head. "No." Cas shakes his head firmly, imbuing it with all the certainty he feels. "No, I don't believe that he is angry."

No relief floods into Dean's countenance, into the still-tense - if not even more tense - shoulder pressed into Cas'. "But he's not doing well?"

Grudgingly, Cas shakes his head again. "He is… healing."

"Nice way of saying it. To be healed, you've gotta be hurt, first." Dean's looking at the bottle again.

Cas nods. "That is true."

Dean nods, resigned. "Yeah." His right hand - the one not hovering a few inches away from Cas' - lifts to scrub at his face again. "I figured."

"You need not worry, Dean. He'll be fine, with time." Dean scoffs, head dropping. "He will. He just needs to adjust. Her leaving might have hurt him, but he'll recover." It occurs to Cas only after he's done speaking that those words would apply well to Dean himself, but he doesn't make the connection outright. It wouldn't turn out well anyway.

"You know, usually, I'd agree with you, but…" He shakes his head. Turns to look at Cas for the first time since they'd sat there. "She's his mom, Cas. And she just left him."

She's your mom too, Cas wants to say. She left you both. Instead, he says, "I know."

Dean's hand drops. (Some part of that motion must have rippled through to the opposite shoulder, because Dean's left arm finds itself pressed against Cas'. Cas doesn't move away. Neither does Dean.) "Guess I'll hafta talk to him tomorrow, huh?"

Cas has to fight not to shrug, in case it'd remind Dean of their proximity. In case it would seem too much like a rejection. "If you like."

Dean nods. "I'll deal with apologies then." He's looking at the bottle like it's salvation. He doesn't move.

Cas tilts his head, half to look at Dean, half in confusion. "Apologies?" Dean isn't looking at him. "What apologies?"

"'Sorry I screwed everything up,' seems to cover it. Maybe tack on an 'again' for good measure. Should be set." His tone is deceptively merry - poor choice of words, but accurate - and unfortunately familiar. There's no self-pity there, no, even though it'd be all too easy for traces to slip in through the cracks. Instead, the words hold only guilt, resolute and certain.

"Dean-"

"Okay, so I'll figure out better phrasing by tomorrow. I'm not in the mood for a workshopping session right now." His words soften, the expression on his face following suit. "Thanks, though, Cas."

Of all the humans in the world, Cas is pretty sure he cares about the most infuriating one. "You misunderstand. It's not a matter of editing your apology as much as it is a matter of removing it entirely."

The only reason Cas' words aren't rejected immediately, he's aware, is that Dean's countenance fills with confusion instead. "What?"

"Your mother's decision to leave was her own. Neither blame nor fault lies with either you or your brother."

There it is: that rejection. "Oh, c'mon, Cas…"

"I mean it, Dean." Cas shifts, facing Dean as well as he can without shifting his right arm. "This was her choice."

"Yes. Her choice." Are the words as hollow as they seem? "Her choice because she missed Heaven. Her choice because we…" He gestures vaguely towards Sam's room, as if he could see it through the walls of his room. "We're not her sons. Not the ones she remembers, at any rate." The hand drops heavily. "Not the ones she wants."

"That's not your fault, Dean."

"How is it not?" The words are a contradiction: quiet, yet powerful. Empty, yet tinged with anger. Hurt, yet self-recriminatory. Everything in between. "You're forgetting why she misses Heaven in the first place." He doesn't wait for Cas' response, doesn't let him interject before continuing. "Because Amara yanked her out of her happy ending and shoved her back down here as a freaking gift."

"How are Amara's actions your responsibility?"

Dean's expression turns incredulous. "You kidding me, man? She outright said that she brought mom back because of me; how is that not my responsibility?"

"Amara has been confined to a cage for millennia, Dean. She'd only just been released. Only just gotten her family back. Is it any wonder that your care for your own family would strike a chord with her?"

"Which still means that it's because of me, Cas." The words are flat. "The point stands."

This is not an especially profitable conversation to be having; Cas steels himself, shifts it over an inch. "I spoke to your mother the other day. She told me that she felt out of place, that she wasn't sure where she belonged. Am I thus responsible for her departure?" Cas is reasonably sure of the answer, but he finds himself waiting anxiously nonetheless, hoping it's not an angry yes.

It's not. "What? No, man, of course not." The expression on Dean's face is incredulous. "How does that make any sense?"

"I didn't successfully stop her from going. I might even have inadvertently made the situation worse."

The incredulity is still there. It might even strengthen. "How could you possibly have-"

"She asked me about my arrival here. Adjusting to life after Heaven, feeling as though I belonged…" Cas isn't sure how good an idea it is to say the next sentence, isn't sure how badly it'll end up being taken. He takes a breath and, simultaneously, the risk. "And I said that I wasn't sure I ever have."

Dean looks somewhere just shy of devastated. (Cas thinks that Dean must not be aware of how much emotion he's showing, of how much is getting through his patented mask.) "Cas-"

"Now, you can't tell me that helped-"

The expression is still there. "Cas-"

"-And it might well have hurt-"

The expression is still there. "Cas-"

"So, now I ask you. Does that make me responsible for her leaving?"

Dean doesn't hesitate. The expression is still there. "Cas, no, of course not, but hold u-"

"Then how can you say that any recrimination falls to you?"

The expression is still there. "Dude, hold up, that doesn't matter; we need to talk about-"

"Dean."

"Cas."

They sit for a moment, silence overtaking the both of them. Cas can't break eye contact, no matter how much his instincts are telling him to look away from shattered emerald, and he half-hates that he put that expression there. The feeling is about equal in magnitude to the sensation of relief that Cas' comment has outraged Dean so extensively that he seems to have forgotten his self-accusation.

Their stare-down ends when Dean breaks the silence with, "You know I'm not just gonna let that go, right?" The question ended with a period in all but grammar.

"I hardly feel that now is the time f-"

The expression returns. "It's very much the time, Cas. What do you mean, now's not the time; of freaking course it's the time, Cas!"

"It's unimportant, Dean."

Shattered was bad; whatever this was - just as broken, tinged with a hint of incredulity and too much concern - is worse. "Cas." His voice, rough at the best of times, sounds like sandpaper. "Tell me you know you're welcome. I know Sam and I, we don't say it much, but you're always wanted here… You know that, right?"

Cas isn't sure he'd have the strength to say no, given the expression Dean's directing his way, the openness of what he's saying and how he's saying it. Luckily, he doesn't have to. "Yes, I… I do believe I do."

Dean blinks. It hurts how much surprise has found its way into his eyes. "Then why-?" The sentence cuts off without warning, the words disappearing on him. He doesn't need them anyway; Cas knows what he's asking.

"This world… It's a human one. And you and your brother, you've saved it, time after time. From demons and monsters… and angels." Cas looks away briefly, trying to select the right words. It's hard, though, when he fears that any word might be the wrong one, might take Dean's tenuous house-of-cards mental state and topple it for good. "And many times… those angels from whom you must save the world have included me." Perhaps it's simply the fact that Purgatory was on his mind earlier, but he thinks back to letting out the Leviathans, to helping Metatron, to saying yes to Lucifer. "You may have been gracious enough to forgive my mistakes, but I find myself incapable of forgetting them."

"Oh, c'mon, man…" His voice made it seem all too easy to just let everything go. Cas feels guilty for how good it is to hear. (This isn't the point he's trying to make, after all.) "None of us're blameless. You've always tried to do the right thing; that's what counts."

Cas can't help but raise an eyebrow at that. "Is that so?"

Dean's nod is earnest. "Yeah, man. And yeah, you made mistakes, but you fixed them."

"It seems to me, Dean Winchester, that you should take your own advice to heart."

Dean rolls his eyes. Cas wishes he could say it's an unexpected response. "Whatever, man."

"Your mother can make her own choices."

Dean shifts. His ready-to-move tension returns. Cas can feel it in his shoulder, in the way he sucks in a breath. And yet he doesn't stand, doesn't move. He just lets out the breath in a frustrated huff of air. "I know, Cas." It sounds tired. He sounds tired. "And she made her choice. To leave." He's not looking at Cas, but his pain has become audible anyway. "That's not your fault." It's touching how insistent he sounds, and Cas would usually take the time to savor the relief it brings. Now, though, he can't. Not when Dean's still talking, voice low and weary. "Or Sam's." Not when he knows where Dean's going with his argument. "Or Amara's." Not when he knows that Dean's a master of wielding verbal weapons, if only at himself. "I know that. You know that. We all know that."

"It may not be Amara's fault, but the responsibility is still hers."

"No." The word is quiet, resigned. It hurts to hear. "No."

"How is it not?"

"She's not even here, Cas." The words sound spur-of-the-moment. Unplanned. Like Dean isn't sure what he's going to say next. Like he's making things up as he goes. It's the same way he talks when a hunt goes wrong and they're facing down the monster of the week, when bluster is all he has left. "She brought Mo-" He swallows harshly. "Mary. She brought Mary back. That's all."

Cas nods, gently. "And is that not the cause of your mother's departure?"

Dean shakes his head. A bitter smile flits onto his lips and twists . "You said it yourself, Cas. 'My mother can make her own choices.'" He breathes out, and the sound is shaky. "She didn't leave because of Amara." He pauses. Drops his head. Exhales again, slowly, as if he thinks it'll push down the pain Cas can hear dripping from his voice. (It won't. It doesn't.) His voice is quiet as he says, "She left because of me."

"No, Dean." Cas shakes his head as vehemently as he can. Their shoulders press together a little more. "Not because of you."

Dean doesn't seem to be listening. "You know, I always thought Zachariah was changing shit. Was screwing with things because he wanted to, because he thought it'd help him… but I'm getting…" A harsh laugh, jagged and wry. "I'm getting a bit doubtful."

Cas isn't sure what Dean means - why Zachariah has floated back into relevance after seven years - but he's reasonably confident he doesn't want to know. He asks anyway. "What do you mean?"

Dean looks over at him, and surprise flickers across his face. "Shit, sorry. Nothing."

"Dean."

He brings up a hand. Drags it through his hair until it looks more like a hedgehog than anything. Lets it drop to his knee again with an uncaring heaviness, as if the strings holding it up had just snapped. "It doesn't matter, Cas. Didn't really mean to go there anyway."

Cas might back off, in other circumstances. But Cas knows Dean Winchester - in pretty much every sense short of the Biblical one - and also knows that he can't just let it go. Not when there's that look in those eyes: guilt and recrimination and self-flagellation all rolled into one. Not when he knows Dean will never speak of it again once the conversation ends, once enough time passes that his walls begin to climb once more. Not when Dean's a master at living with things that shouldn't have to be lived with.

So he doesn't. "Dean, tell me." The other man opens his mouth to speak, and Cas interrupts with a quiet, "Please." (It might not be playing fair, but Cas can't bring himself to care, not if he can help Dean as a result.)

"I don't want to talk about this, Cas." At least he's not denying it anymore, Cas supposes, though he doesn't like it any better. "It's stupid."

"I doubt it's stupid, Dean Winchester. You have too little regard for your own safety, and your mental well-being fares even worse."

Dean rolls his eyes. "It was years ago, Cas. It's not that big a deal."

Cas' eyebrow lifts of its own accord. "Something happening 'years ago' does not make it 'not a big deal,' Dean." He uses the finger-quotes, even though he knows it's not done. It makes Dean smile, even if it's just the barest twitch of his lips, and that's worth breaching social customs. "What happened?"

Dean opens his mouth to speak. It closes again. (Cas is reasonably confident he's not making up the violent flash of something like pain in the little he can see of Dean's eyes. He's even more confident that Dean's hands forming into fists are a very bad sign, and the way he's looking towards the alcohol again is still more proof that something is very wrong.) He shakes his head. "C'mon, Cas, I barely remember it. Just let it go."

It's a lie. Or, perhaps, a self-deception, something Dean's told himself enough times that he actually believes it. "Dean, you'll pardon me if I don't. Please tell me."

Dean looks over at him almost immediately, the turn of his head sudden and seemingly instinctive. "Why do you care, man? I told you, it doesn't matter. I'll be fine, so why-" He breaks off, hand fluttering vaguely in Cas' direction. "Why do this?"

Cas knows that Dean isn't angry at him. Knows that the emphasis of his words stems less from anger and more from disbelief, from absolute incredulity. (Can feel the press of Dean's shoulder as it still rests against Cas', even amidst wide motions and shifts of position.) Cas knows that Dean isn't angry at him, and yet Cas also kinda wishes he were.

After all, if Dean were angry, it'd be easier. Anger is simple. Hurt and pain and loss and guilt and everything else that Cas can see roiling within Dean's expression? Not so simple. (It's hard to help someone with emotions they don't deserve to have to experience, and even harder when they feel that it's all deserved. Or, worse, that it's better than they deserve.)

"Because," Cas says. "I want to." He doesn't go into more detail; it isn't going to be productive anyway. "Tell me, Dean."

He still looks confused, but he opens his mouth anyway. He tries anyway. "I-" A pause. Another try. "You remember when Walt and Roy…" He makes a gesture, hand cutting across his throat. "You know, killed us? Sam and me?"

Cas nods. "Yes." (It's hard to forget.)

"Well." He swallows. "We ran into Zachariah while we were up there." He pauses, sniffs once as though he's trying to steel himself. "And mom."

One of the benefits of being an angel possessing a human vessel is that, for the most part, very little ever goes wrong. Each and every system is run according to normal, and anything that does fall outside of normalcy is remedied with a simple healing. Temperature, blood pressure, vision, et cetera; with the exception of that one horrible period when Cas was human, Jimmy Novak's vessel has been kept in perfect working order.

Thus, it should have been impossible for Cas to feel his blood run cold. Regardless, Dean's words - and his tone, and his expression - are worrisome enough that it happens anyway. He nods. "Okay."

"And-" Dean breaks off, jaw clenching shut, eyes closing just after. "She, uh…" And then the moment shatters and he's shaking his head. "Look, man, this is stupid. It's not a big deal, okay? Just… let it go."

"Dean." Cas takes a risk and shifts, turning to face him. His shoulder feels suddenly, painfully cold as they move out of their close proximity. (He's reasonably - unfortunately - sure that he's not making up the expression of closed-off disappointment-verging-on-hurt that flickers across Dean's face for a split-second before being swallowed down again.) The motion is necessary, though. It lets them face each other, for one thing. For another, it allows him to put his hand on Dean's shoulder, hand unconsciously mimicking the contours of the scar he'd left there so long ago. "It's not stupid. Tell me."

He tries. (Cas knows he tries, can see his mouth opening and closing without anything coming out, can see too many thoughts and emotions swirling violently in his expression.) A minute passes. Two. Five. And then he stiffens again, one hand - his right hand - scrubbing violently over his face. "I can't freaking say it, man. Don't make me." Dread settles in Cas' stomach. For Dean to be this open - this communicative - about something is always a bad sign. "Don't you have your mojo back? Can't you just…" Dean motions, both hands waving in vague, floundering motions. "Look?"

Cas can't help being surprised by that, and his thoughts falter slightly along their tracks. "What?" Memories of countless stay outta my heads sound in his head, and he blinks. (He's reasonably confident that going inside someone's head doesn't qualify as personal space.) "Dean, do-" He breaks off, tries again. "Are-" Another attempt. "Are you certain?" (He feels weird about even asking, about even contemplating breaking Dean's rule of never letting anything into his head if he can avoid it.)

"Yeah, man, before I change my mind." Cas hesitates. "C'mon, Cas, hurry it up. Yes, I consent. Yes, I trust you. Hurry the hell up."

It's unfair, Cas thinks, for Dean to just drop those words into conversation so easily. I trust you, as if it were that simple. I trust you, so freely given. I trust you, as if it didn't matter. As if Cas wasn't very nearly bowled over each and every time Dean gave him the honor of trusting him. (Cas knows, after all, that those words aren't that simple. Knows that Dean Winchester doesn't trust easily. Knows that it takes a helluva lot to earn that trust in the first place. Knows that, once it's been given, it's pretty damn near unconditional. Knows that, for all Cas' mistakes, Dean trusts him anyway.)

It's unfair, Cas thinks, for Dean to act as though that means nothing when it means everything.

He knows the delay is wearing on Dean - can feel it in how tensely he's sitting, how his hands are tapping restless patterns on his knee - but he can't bring himself to stop dwelling on those words. On I trust you playing on repeat in his head. On how much of a sin it is that Dean can't see how much they mean to Cas.

"You gonna get on with it, then?", Dean asks.

Cas nods. "Of course."