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Chapter Four

Naomi was on the phone handling reservations when Castiel walked in with Claire, so he managed to slip past her and into the kitchen before she could say anything.

"Who's this?" Anna asked with raised eyebrows. Everyone else had paused in their prep work too and was staring at Castiel and the child who looked like she could be his daughter, expressions ranging from mild bemusement to total shock.

"This is my niece Claire," Castiel said, answering Anna but addressing everyone. "She's going to be hanging out here tonight." He wondered if he should mention the mute thing, then decided that they would either figure it out or assume she was just shy.

"Hello, Claire," Anna said, bending down to the little girl's level with some difficulty. "I'm Anna. I'm your uncle's sous chef."

Claire gave Castiel a questioning look.

"That means she's second in command," Castiel explained, "and when I'm not in the kitchen, she's in charge of everything." He noticed Naomi standing by the door, giving him a we-need-to-talk look, so he led Claire to the chef's table, the closest thing to a quiet corner there was in a restaurant kitchen, and got her settled. "Do your homework before the coloring book," he said, "and in a few minutes I'll find you something to eat."

Since that first dinner, he hadn't had much more success at getting her to eat his cooking. He'd started resorting to peanut butter sandwiches which were at least marginally healthier than pizza, but he couldn't shake the guilty feeling that he was turning into his mother.

As he started to move away, Claire grabbed his sleeve and looked up at him imploringly. He was getting pretty good at interpreting her silent communications, but this one took him a moment to decipher. When he realized what was worrying her, his heart broke a little bit more.

"I won't go far," he promised, brushing a stray curl off her face. "I'll stay where you can see me, all right?"

She nodded and reluctantly let him go. He felt her eyes following him all the way across the kitchen.

"I take it this was your family emergency," Naomi said when he joined her.

"Yes. Please don't ask me to explain." He was not ready to talk about Jimmy, especially not with someone he didn't even like. "Suffice to say, she's my responsibility, and I couldn't find a babysitter. She won't be any trouble, I promise. She's a very quiet kid."

Naomi tilted her head and gave him a slightly puzzled look. "Castiel, I have no objection. Why do you assume I'm going to fight with you?"

He paused, feeling like he'd missed a step going down stairs. "Because you usually do."

Naomi's mouth twitched in what might have been a faint smile. "Well, not about this. Contrary to what you may believe, I have no wish to make your life unnecessarily difficult. You may bring her here whenever you need to, provided of course that it doesn't interfere with the smooth running of the kitchen."

"Of course," he said, then added a little belatedly, "Thank you."

Fortunately she left it at that. Castiel didn't think he could have handled much more of this strange new friendliness. He was waiting for the other shoe to drop.

~o0o~

Castiel was standing in the big fridge, staring blankly at the shelves of ingredients and trying to think of a way to combine them into something a nine year old would eat, when the door opened and Dean came in.

"Watcha looking for?" he asked, letting the door swing closed behind him to keep in the cold.

Castiel turned and almost immediately forgot what the question had been. The fridge was big but still a relatively small space for two grown men to share, and the forced proximity plus the cold made Castiel suddenly acutely aware of Dean's body, how big and warm and solid it was. God, what would it feel like to be pinned under that broad chest or to wake cuddled up against it?

"Cas? Earth to Cas."

Castiel mentally shook himself, his face suddenly feeling significantly warmer than the rest of him. He was an adult, so why couldn't he stop fantasizing about Dean like a teenager with a crush? Then he registered what Dean had said and blinked. "What did you just call me?"

"Cas. Short for Castiel? Sorry. I'm a compulsive nicknamer. If you don't like it, I —"

"No, it's fine." Jimmy had always called him that, and maybe the reminder should have hurt, but it didn't. Quite the opposite. It eased the ache of loss, made him feel almost like a whole person again instead of a pile of jagged edged fragments.

"Okay," Dean said after a slightly awkward silence. "So what were you looking for?"

Castiel sighed and went back to his frustrated contemplation of the fridge's contents though he was still very aware of Dean, so close but as untouchable as if they were on different planets. "Something to feed Claire."

"Ah. Picky eater?"

"Understatement. I have cooked for the most notoriously hard to please food critics in the world and gotten rave reviews, but I can't get her to even taste most of what I make."

"Well, with kids it's less about quality than it is about familiarity. What's she used to?"

"I don't know, and I can't exactly ask her."

"Why not?"

"Because she doesn't talk. Not at the moment anyway."

"Oh. Yeah, I did that for a while when I was a kid."

Castiel blinked at Dean in mild surprise again. "You did?"

"Yeah. After my mom died, I didn't speak a word for almost a year. I guess I felt like that was something I could control." Dean said it casually, not like he was sharing a secret, but Castiel still felt like he'd been offered something private, a glimpse behind the mask of charm and easy humor that Dean showed the rest of the world. Before he could think of an appropriate reply, Dean said, "What about grilled cheese? I never met a kid who didn't like grilled cheese."

~o0o~

Apparently Claire was no exception. She gobbled up four sandwiches. Castiel tried halfheartedly to resent Dean just a little for succeeding so quickly where he himself had failed repeatedly, but he wasn't selfish enough to be unhappy about anything that made Claire happy.

The books and games she had brought remained in her backpack untouched. Once she finished her homework, Claire sat quietly and watched the activity of the kitchen as though it was the most interesting television program ever made. At about ten o'clock she fell asleep sitting up and almost fell off her chair, so Castiel carefully moved her to Naomi's couch.

When they had done their final cleanup and everyone was putting on their coats and wishing each other good night, Dean handed Castiel a piece of paper with a name and a phone number.

"She's a professional babysitter," he said in answer to Castiel's quizzical look. "She helped out a friend of mine while his wife was in the hospital. She's trustworthy and really good with kids. I don't know what her schedule is like these days, but she might have an opening. Or she might know someone else."

"Thank you," Castiel said, tucking the paper in his pocket. "Dean, I feel I owe you an apology. For last night. I was annoyed with Naomi really, but you got caught in the crossfire which you did not deserve. I'd like it if we could start over. As friends this time."

Dean smiled. "Yeah, I'd like that too. You need help getting Sleeping Beauty home?"

"No, I'll get a cab, but thank you."

"Okay. Night, Cas. See you tomorrow."

"Good night, Dean."