This chapter is a little short, but oh well. At least it's here :D

Thank you all so much for your wonderful support from my last chapter. I really, truly appreciate it. It's been a hard week, but I think I'm okay. At first it didn't really sink in. I kept thinking "Oh, next time I see Papaw we should...oh. Right...he's gone." And I kept having to remind myself. He'd been MIA for so long because of his family that it just felt like that still. Like I wasn't seeing him, but I would again someday and he was still out there, you know? But no. He's dead. And it hurts, it really does. I have almost 18 years of memories and they just keep attacking me at the worst of times, like when I'm at school. The funeral was...difficult, kinda.

Get this - his family didn't include us in the obituary, or the funeral. We made our own private ceremony and just said stuff about Papaw because we didn't have a reverend or anything. Mom read my memoir I made for him outloud. I got hugged sooooo many times O.o now I don't want anyone touching me, that's how much I was hugged. Sheesh. It was...um...weird, seeing his grave. The dirt, all padded down but, you know, fresh. And what his family did...I think it's the betrayal that hurts the most, because I spent 4 years with those people. We went to cookouts all the time, moto-cross races, holidays, vacations...everything. And they just turned their backs on us.

I didn't tell him I loved him the last time I saw him. I wanted to. But I had a horrible headache that day (really bad) and so I was pretty quiet. I sat next to him and stuff but didn't know what to say. He was awake and alert and talking but I didn't know what to do or say...I have a bad habit of that. Hospitals freak me out. But I've been in them so much that when someone tells me someone's in the hospital, I'm just like "alright, when are they getting out?" and I'm not really phased. Which sucks. I really miss him. I want him back. But I know he's happy where he is now, with his brothers and Mamaw. He wrote on a little napkin after Mamaw died that he was just counting the days until he could see her again. He kept it with her picture.

If anyone wants to see the memoir (though I don't know why you would) just let me know and I will either send it to you or post it on one of fictionpress accounts, haha. It was just a nice way to get everything off my chest, even though it was written before he died...so it's not really in past tense.

Anyway I am so sorry for boring you with details of my life! It's just that I was moved by the strong response you guys gave me. Thanks so much! It helped.

I will end this long rant and say...

Onward!

Chapter Sixteen

Sam looked so small in his hospital bed, despite the fact that he had grown like a weed since Castiel had known him. Castiel stared down at the pale form of the normally active teen and frowned worriedly, his brother at his side and John standing in front of him, right at Sam's bedside. Castiel slowly moved around without making a sound and stood on the other side of the bed, looking down at the static figure and the slack face. His fingers reached out and brushed lightly over the skin of Sam's wrist, as though reassuring himself of the younger Winchester's presence, and he felt a little relaxed at the natural warmth of the body. Sam was okay - just unconscious.

So was Dean. They were both fine. They would both be okay. Maybe they were hurt now, but everything would be okay. He had to keep reminding himself of that. They would both be okay and Castiel wasn't losing anyone today, or any time soon. He felt almost like he could breathe again, but he knew he wouldn't really be able to relax until he got to see Dean and touch him and feel for himself that he was there and that he wasn't just some figment of Castiel's hopeful imagination.

Jimmy's hand rested briefly on his shoulder. He slowly tore his gaze away from the slack-faced teen and glanced at his twin. "I'm going to go get something from the cafeteria, give you guys some time…do you want anything?" he asked generously, his expression showing how sorry he was.

But Castiel didn't want people to be sorry. It wasn't anyone's fault except the bastard who had set fire to the house in the first place. If people started saying how sorry they were, then it would make this all the more real and he wouldn't be able to pretend everything was okay. People only said sorry when things were bad, and he had to believe things were going to be just fine. The doctor had told him everything was going to be okay, that everything looked good, and he kept that in his heart as he just shook his head and looked back down at Sam.

There was a thick patch of bandaging on Sam's shoulder, where he'd been burned. His face was a little scratched up but otherwise fine. IV drips were attached to his right arm, the side John was on. Castiel was glad to see, though, that the only machine he was hooked up to was the heart monitor, which showed a steady, even rhythm. Sam was okay. And he would be waking up soon, according to Dr. Gerald.

"John?" Jimmy asked, glancing over at the blinded Winchester.

John gruffly shook his head and gave a noncommittal grunt in reply. His fingers stretched out and wrapped firmly around Sam's wrist as he felt around for a chair with his legs. Jimmy went around and pushed a chair toward him, which John accepted with a nod, and then Jimmy exited the room, leaving them alone with Sam.

"I can't believe this happened," John said, scrubbed a hand across his face. His cracked voice shattered the silence of the room and Castiel looked at him fully. The man looked ruffled. His clothes were rumpled, his hair tussled as though he'd been running his fingers through it far too often, and he just looked tired. Exhausted, really, as though this experience had taken years from him.

"I know," Castiel whispered back in reply, because he couldn't believe it had happened either. He still couldn't believe what he'd been told, that the killer may have been after the Winchesters as well. Dean was probably going to have to leave after this attack, and so even if he wound up being okay, he was still going to get taken away from Castiel, and that thought cut him to the core. It made his throat close up and his chest tighten, and suddenly it was hard to breathe. He took a moment and tore his gaze away and toward the floor, where he stared as he struggled to get his breaths under control. When he thought he was steady enough, he looked back up.

"I'm sorry you had to find out this way," John said sympathetically. "Dean just…I don't think he wanted to worry you unless he absolutely had to. He wasn't sure if…we had to leave. None of use were."

"But…" Castiel said, because he could hear the but in John's soft-spoken words. And he knew he wasn't going to like what he was about to hear. A part of him wanted to shut down his hearing, or shout at the top of his lungs until he couldn't hear the man's next words, but a much larger part forced him to stay quiet and listen.

"But we will probably have to definitely leave now," John said slowly, as though trying to placate Castiel with his words, not matter what the words were. "It won't be permanent."

Sure…it wouldn't be permanent. They could say that, but could they mean it? Because who knew when this guy would be caught, or how many people it actually was, or what they really wanted…For all Castiel knew, if they left, he would never see Dean again, or Sam or any of them. They had become like Castiel's second family and he loved them both dearly, and the thought of never seeing them again…

It hurt. A lot. His eyes stung but he blinked back the wetness.

He didn't know what to say in response to John. All he knew was that it felt like there was a hole gaping in his chest and it just kept growing wider.

It felt like he was losing everything.

It was nearly an hour later when the doctor told them they could see Dean. John allowed Castiel to go first, saying he was going to go down and get himself a cup of coffee to help calm his nerves. He looked like he needed it, too. He kept twitching in his seat and scrubbing at his face like his skin was itching.

Castiel followed the doctor down a long white hallway. Nurses in scrubs wandered from room to room, occasionally stopping to look over their clipboards before they continued moving on. Castiel ignored them as best he could and focused instead on the doctor. The doctor stopped in front of a door and gestured inside. Castiel nodded his thanks to the man and then twisted the knob and entered the room.

Machines were what he saw first. A heart monitor that showed a slower-than-normal rhythm and a ventilator. A clear mask covered Dean's mouth and nose. It misted briefly when he breathed, and the machine whirred with it. Castiel slowly approached the bed. Dean, too, looked smaller than normal, covered in the thin white blanket in the equally white bed. Maybe the doctors had such white beds and covers and pillows so it would make the patients not look as pale as they would otherwise. Still, though, Dean was pale. His freckles stood out starkly in contrast. His long dark lashes showed easily on his closed eyelids.

Equally white bandaging covered Dean's forehead in a small ring. It almost look like he was wearing a bandana but Castiel knew better. A few of Dean's longer bangs dipped onto the bandaging, showing its dark blondeness. A few IV's stuck out of Dean's left arm, the one furthest away from Castiel, and were hooked to a machine. It looked like a medicine drip but Castiel wasn't sure. Patches of bandaging covered his arms in haphazard patterns, probably from the burns the doctor had mentioned. He almost looked like his arms were sun-burnt. His left ankle was elevated slightly and encased in bandaging. He looked like a half-wrapped mummy.

Castiel heaved a sigh and sat down next to the bed on a white plastic chair. Without hesitation, he reached a hand out and delicately grabbed a hold of Dean's, gently rubbing his fingers over the bruised and rough knuckles. Blood was present under Dean's fingertips. It looked as though he had smashed his finger. It was covered in a clear bandage, probably just to keep air out and to keep the medicine in. Castiel could see the swelling. For a moment, he just stared at his boyfriend's hand and then he finally looked away and focused on Dean's face.

It was slack and pale just like Sam's. The contrasting color of the freckles just helped to magnify the pallor of his skin.

"I wish this didn't happen," Castiel sighed. He knew it wouldn't change anything, but he felt like saying it all the same. He just wanted to talk to Dean, to somehow reassure himself that everything was okay. "I love you, you big idiot. Why do you keep checking yourself into hospitals? I thought you said the food sucks." He smiled somewhat bitterly to himself and sighed yet again.

The room smelled sterile and like medicine. It made Castiel remember the liquid medicines his parents used to make him choke down when he was sick as a kid, before he'd started taking medicine in pill form. He wrinkled his nose in contempt, remembering a particularly horrid yellow liquid that had made him want to throw up just thinking about it when he'd been younger.

"You look like shit," Castiel felt like telling Dean. He could almost hear Dean's stubborn protest in his head, and it made him want to smile, and so he did. Faintly, but he smiled nevertheless. "Sam's fine. So is your precious car. And your father. So just worry about getting better yourself, okay? We're all here for you." He didn't know what to say, but he didn't want to stop talking. It was easier to convince himself everything was going to be okay if he just kept talking to Dean.

Dean didn't respond in the slightest. Castiel didn't expect him to. The doctor's had said they were keeping him sedated for the time being. He was unconscious. He probably wouldn't be waking any time soon.

But Castiel desperately wanted him to wake up. The two had a lot to talk about. And he wanted to see Dean's eyes again, to know he wasn't lying when he said he was 'fine'. Was that so much to ask? Why did this kind of stuff have to keep happening? It wasn't fair! Not to anyone. Especially not to Dean, or Sam. Or John.

None of this was fair.

At all.

"I hope you wake up soon. I could really go for hearing your voice right about now."

Maybe that sounded cheesy. He could almost hear Dean complaining about chick-flick moments.

The thought almost made him grin. Almost.

"Wake up soon, man. It's too quiet otherwise."

Everything had been going so fine…and then this had happened. Hadn't they all been through enough?

Why, God? Castiel thought. Why does this stuff keep happening?

He didn't understand. He didn't know what to do.

He just felt helpless all around.

Sighing, he scrubbed a hand across his face. He tightened his grip on Dean's hand, wanting to feel it clutch back, but nothing happened. He didn't really expect anything to, but he'd been hoping something would. He'd been hoping that Dean would respond in some way, but he really was unconscious.

Castiel wondered if Dean could even hear him.

He used his other hand and lightly touched the tips of his fingers to the bandaging around Dean's head. Then he combed those fingers gently through the dark blonde hair. "Wake up soon," he said again. "I'm tired of you making me worry about you. If you want to be in a hospital so much, become a doctor or something."

He shook his head and sighed yet again. He seemed to be doing a lot of that, he noticed, but he honestly didn't know what to do. He felt so helpless, so useless…

What could he do to help Dean? Or Sam?

"Everything will be okay," he said aloud.

He wasn't sure if he was saying that to himself or to Dean.

Maybe a little of both.

Heh hope it sounds okay! Sorry not much happens, lol. Thanks for reading and please review!

~Muffy the Dough Slayer~