After a second, Dean said, "Look, do you need to get something to eat? There's a diner down the street." The practical question snapped Cas out of his stare, thank God, because Dean was trying really hard not to squirm.

"Yeah," Cas said, and ran his hands back through his hair. It didn't make it lie any flatter. "Yeah, but I wanna take a hot shower first. Been a while, you know?" In anyone else, Dean would've called his tone a desperate attempt to sound casual, and he wasn't sure what to do with it coming from Cas.

"Sure, yeah," he said. "You, um, need anything?"

Cas shook his head and scooted to the side of the bed. He sat there for a few seconds, his hands braced on the mattress at his sides, and stared some more, but at least it was at the floor instead of at Dean.

Sam, on his way to his laptop, said tentatively, "We can wash your clothes."

Cas looked up from contemplating his feet and gave Sam one of those wide, meaningless smiles. "That can wait till we get to Bobby's," he said. "I mean, I assume you're going to want to head there?" He glanced at Dean, and then away, and clapped his hands on his thighs as he stood; the gesture was bizarrely, jarringly human.

"Bobby's, yeah," Dean said, feeling like he was a half-step behind, and Cas nodded on his way to the bathroom.

"Great. Hey, do you have a package of razors in here?"

"Yeah. In the green—" Dean began, and Cas, one hand on the doorframe, threw him a look that was all indulgence.

"I know where you keep things, Dean," he said, and swung the door shut. Dean looked helplessly over at his brother, who was watching with an expression that suggested that something was becoming clear to him, and got a shrug.

"Hell," Dean muttered, and went to finish cleaning Sam's gun.

Cas stayed in the shower long enough that Dean actually started to worry; even the crappy motels he and Sam favored had continuous-flow water heaters, so it wasn't like Cas was sitting in there shivering, but Dean had to wonder what exactly he was doing. It was close to half an hour before the water shut off.

When Cas emerged from the bathroom, he was clean-shaven; it made him look even thinner, if not much more respectable. He also looked like he wasn't wearing enough clothes for the weather, which was shaping up to be rainy and bone-achingly chilly. Dean couldn't persuade him to put on socks or heavier shoes; Cas just shrugged and said, "I don't get sick," and only accepted one of Dean's jackets because Dean told him he'd stand out too much without it. But by the time the dawn was well progressed (which was, at least, not as early as it would've been in summer) they were on their way to the diner.

Dean slid into the booth across from Sam before he thought about it, and ended up with Cas next to him. In and of itself that was OK, except Cas sat leaning back like he wanted to put his feet on the table and canted half-sideways, so close to Dean's side that Dean could feel his body heat. He gave Cas a skeptical look, and Cas grinned at him and didn't move.

The waitress was of the middle-aged, businesslike, not-impressed-by-your-charm-boy type, so Dean didn't try flirting with her. He ordered pancakes and bacon and coffee and rolled his eyes when Sam requested oatmeal—seriously, oatmeal, were they still twelve?

Then it was Cas's turn to order. He asked for oatmeal too (Sam covertly flipped Dean off, which Dean ignored). "That all?" the waitress asked, sounding bored.

"Pancakes," Cas said. "Blueberry, if you have them. Two orders of bacon, hash browns, anything you have in the way of fresh fruit, three scrambled eggs, coffee, and orange juice."

All three of them stared at him. The waitress's expression matched Sam's perfectly, and Dean had the feeling his own completed the set. "Please," Cas said sweetly. The waitress wrote on her order pad, said, "This might take a little bit," and headed for the kitchen, beaming disbelief into the air around her so hard Dean could almost see it.

He turned back to Cas and was opening his mouth when Sam said, "Hungry?"

"I was living in the Apocalypse," Cas said. He didn't sound even a little defensive, just matter-of-fact. "You know how long it's been since I've had bacon?"

"That's just a lot of food," Sam said, and Cas laughed, too loud in the otherwise-empty diner, though at least he'd lowered his voice to say "Apocalypse".

"I'm really hungry," he said. "Not enough to go around, and people who screw up get short rations. To be fair he does it to himself too."

"Who?" Sam asked, his forehead wrinkling in puzzled concern. Dean turned to look out the window, because he already knew the answer to that one.

"Dean," Cas said in a tone that suggested it was obvious. "It's pretty effective, all things considered."

"Shoulda punched that dick when I had the chance," Dean muttered to the parking lot.

There was a pause, then Sam said, "You can make yourself sick trying to eat too much." He was doing the Sincere Voice that Dean hated because he still had no damn defense against it, twenty five damn years after Sam learned to talk.

Cas sighed and actually reached across the table to pat Sam's hand. "It's fine," he said. "Last night's adventure notwithstanding, I do know my limits." Apparently Cas couldn't take the Sincere Voice either.

Sam didn't reply, and after a second Cas poked Dean in the shoulder and said, "When were you there?"

Dean blinked and turned back to look at Cas, whose expression was no more than mildly curious. "Uh, where?"

Cas rolled his eyes and said, "The future, Dean, don't play dumb. When was it?" Dean had no idea what to say; it must have shown on his face because Cas went on impatiently, "Come on, I need to know my expiration date if I'm gonna plan ahead. Be a shame to let my stash go to waste."

"But—no, Cas, you're here now. You're not going back."

"You can't guarantee that," Cas said, with a sudden total seriousness that made him Castiel again, just for a second. "We have no idea how I got here, so we have to assume I'm going back." He smiled, a small and bitter thing that was still more real than any other smile Dean had ever seen on his face. "It's a nice vacation, but I can't count on it."

Dean stared at him, speechless, and after a second the smile broadened again and Cas's voice melted back into carefree sarcasm. "I mean, if I do stay...I'm not looking forward to living through the Apocalypse again, but at least here I'll have time for some more hot showers."

Dean had to work at it for a second, but finally he unclenched his jaw enough to say, "By the time I made it to the camp it was October second, the night of the second. We drove all night the third, got there right after dawn."

Cas chuckled and leaned his head back into the brown vinyl of the seat. "Oh, man. Oh, that's...that's perfect."

"What day was it when you...left?" Sam asked. He looked worried, not that that was anything new. Sometimes Dean thought worried was Sam's default expression.

"The thirtieth," Cas said, still staring at the ceiling and smiling.

"Thirtieth of what?" Dean asked, though he was fairly sure he didn't want to know the answer, and Castiel rolled his head enough to meet Dean's eyes.

"September," he said.

Son of a bitch, Dean thought. The waitress showed up with coffee cups, setting them down with a series of porcelain clinks. She poured in pointed silence, watching Cas skeptically; he either didn't notice or pretended not to.

When she was gone again, Cas said, "Dean told me he had a lead on the Colt, but I thought it was just like all the other leads. Guess not."

"Oh, crap," Dean said, because it was only just occurring to him that Cas didn't know. He met Sam's eyes and saw the same unhappy realization in them.

"What?" Cas asked, looking back and forth between them. He sat up straight and pulled one of the coffee cups close, reaching past Dean for the sugar dispenser.

"Things...other things are different here," Dean said carefully. "We got a line on the Colt. Managed to get hold of it." Cas tensed up again, still close enough to Dean's side that Dean could feel it. "Did you, you and I, go to Carthage? With Death?"

"Yes," Cas said slowly. He was pouring sugar into his cup at a rate that was visibly raising the level of the liquid. Dean didn't comment; the guy deserved to have his coffee however he liked it, even if how he liked it was sweet enough to rot teeth. "Ellen and Joanna Beth went with us, but they...damn. Here too?"

"Yeah," Sam said. "They still—"

"They still died," Dean said. "Because I froze up when I heard the hounds." His hands wanted to curl into fists, so he grabbed his own cup, ignoring Sam's sharp look; Sam had tried to convince him it wasn't his fault, but Dean knew better. "But that's, Jesus, not the important part."

Sam said, "I distracted him. He was in the middle of the ritual to raise Death, and I went up and let him monologue at me so Dean could get to him."

"I couldn't afford to miss," Dean said quietly, staring into his coffee so he wouldn't have to look at Cas. "So I waited till I was close, real close. Bet he got powder burns, that close. And I shot him in the head."

Cas set the sugar dispenser down very carefully and wrapped his hands around the cheap white coffee cup. "How long did it take for him to get back up?" he asked, his voice devoid of inflection.

No one said anything for a few seconds. Dean could hear the cook clattering around in the kitchen. Finally, Sam swallowed and said, "Not long."

Cas drew in a breath and held it. Dean glanced at him. He had his eyes closed, and no other expression on his face. "So the Colt doesn't work," Cas said at last.

"No," Dean said, and didn't know where to go from there.