Trigger warning: This chapter has a segment that involves psychological trauma from a car accident. There is a segment later in this long-ass chapter that that aims to pacify that trauma.

Also, my friend who reviewed this chapter has asked me to tell you all to grab a blanket, pillow, box of tissues, or some other cuddleable object.

Simple Pleasures ~ Chapter 6

Friday passed at the grinding pace of daytime television. Dean turned it off when a news segment about the tumbling ambulance came on the afternoon news, but he found the white noise more helpful than silence and turned it back on again. When Bobby came over to bring Dean back to his baby Dean thought he'd be able to drive around town, clear his mind, but with the sun setting early he found his mind going back to the notebook flapping in the wind. He drove back to his apartment, stopping at a drive-thru for dinner, and returned to the numb of banal television.

That night he shut his eyes but snapped them open only a few hours later gripping his sheets, unsure whether he was staring at his closet or the mangled body in the mini-coupe several days ago. He returned to the altar of television to sacrifice his consciousness.

Dean wanted simplicity. Simple rules meant simple pleasures. The world was happier, easier to get through when you had and quick answer for what was right and wrong. Was it really a sin to want that simplicity? If it was it shouldn't be.

Dean fell into his pillow Saturday night. Driving around during the day hadn't removed this cloud of noxious ambiguity from his head. By the time he ate dinner he'd decided he'd just tough out the notebook, the dead roses, and that goddamn mother-fucking clock. Yeah, just ignore it. Get taken down by a bunch of whiney things that happened over a year ago? Stupid. He repeated this mental mantra while his face pressed into his pillowcase.

But thinking of this as a mental mantra reminded Dean of his other mantra, the one that begged God not to let him be attracted to men. God. Heh. Given everything that had happened in the last few days, betting on God's existence seemed about as smart as deus ex machina. Dean might have wanted simplicity, not lazy stupidity.

Though… that mantra reminded Dean of something else. He smirked into the pillow, recalling snippets of his latest fantasy involving a certain winged barista… involving the shower… looking down into those bright blue eyes… or maybe looking up into them, he hadn't figured out which position was better… tearing down the shower curtain… pressing up against the wall and grabbing those arms and—

There was no way he was getting to sleep if he continued down this road. As that thought entered his mind so did another: It's wrong to be attracted to men.

"Fuck," Dean muttered into his pillow. Right as his brain was reminding him of Castiel's words about strength and just liking what you like, Dean got up and grabbed a swig of whiskey before returning to bed. A few more minutes of telling his brain to stuff it, and he drifted.

Buzzing phone. Dean's body said 'No, fuck off, sleeping.' His phone kept buzzing. He opened his eyes, glanced at the clock. 1:55 am. AAA, he thought. By contract he was obligated to answer. He grabbed his cell on cardboard box that acted as his bed-stand and, after a very long groan, answered. "What?"

"You sold the house."

"Sammy?" Dean was now awake.

"Mom and Dad's house, the place we grew up in Dean, you sold it."

"Yeah, last year," Dean said, putting his free hand over his face. "What about it?"

"What the hell Dean! Did it occur to you that maybe you should ask me?"

"Not really," Dean droned. "You were in a real hurry to get out of here, like always, and oh yeah, Merry Christmas. It's a month late but—"

"Why the HELL did you sell our family's house, Dean?" Sam's voice rattled the phone's plastic casing. "What in the world made you think you had the right to-"

"Law school, jack-ass!" Dean shouted back. "You wanted to go to law school, and there were mom's medical bills to pay, then both of their funeral bills and debts, but you wanted law school…"

"…No… No!" Sam yelled. "I got a tuition package! I got loans! You just hated Dad for-!"

"How're you paying those loans, Sam? Oh right, you're not, because they're all in the family's account which went to me after mom and dad bit it. And believe me buddy that tuition package doesn't cover everything, like undergrad loans, the medical bills, funeral expenses, lawyer fees, mom and dad's debts, living expenses for Kansas Ci- - -" He realized he was repeating himself. "You would have known all of this if you'd come home for Christmas, Sam, or any fucking time before that! Seriously, what the hell man!"

"…You shouldn't have sold the house," Sam eventually said.

"Yeah, I got that," Dean said, waking up more. "Why…Dude, you haven't talked to me in fucking months and you call in the middle of the night? What gives, man? What-?"

He heard a click, then a dial tone. Dean sat up and cycled through his contacts list, finding Sam's number, and calling. One ring. Two. Three. On the fifth Dean hissed, "Bitch," and chucked the phone into the darkness. It bounced off the dresser and thumped against the ground.

Dean fell back on his bed, arm over his face, willing sleep to come back to him, but after half an hour he understood the butterfly was gone for the night. He sat up, bleary eyed and numb. He could feel his limbs and fingers, that wasn't the problem. The problem was his brother, and the he didn't want to think about the problem. So how does one not think about something? One numbs, by thought or alcohol, and Dean was too tired to go to the kitchen for the latter.

He stared at the wall for several minutes, hoping that if he was still enough sleep might land on his head again…

A car revved and raced by the apartment, and in the darkness Dean was back on the road, opening his eyes as the blare of ambulance sirens hung like a haze in the air. The notebook… Cassie's notebook, her idea book, was lying on the road, open and pages flapping in the wind, towards the end of her stories. Then he focused on that blisteringly smart and beautiful young woman lying on the other side of the road with her one-eyed stare. The other half of her face was crushed in on a mile marker.

Dean scrambled out of bed and turned on the lights. The moment the dark was gone so was his screaming memory, but it hung outside the windows and his bedroom door, waiting in the shadows to haunt him again.

He couldn't stay here. He didn't know where he could go, but that didn't matter. Dean threw on every light in his apartment as he pawed around for his jacket, shoes, and keys, didn't bother to turn anything off when he ran out the door. After a few minutes of driving he realized that this probably wasn't the best idea either. After all, this was the car that smashed into that pick-up truck. That he smashed into that… the one moment he wasn't watching the road, just that one second… Dean remembered every oily second he spent rebuilding his baby, but he couldn't put her back together all the way. He was supposed to protect her, take care of her, but just like his Dad said, he didn't deserve her.

Hammering heart, Dean pulled over to the side of the road. That was a simple rule: when you're freaking the fuck out, stop driving. Just the thought of something plain and direct he could follow helped Dean calm down a little. He rattled off the other simple rules he knew: Don't stop in the middle of the road, always try the on-off switch first if something isn't working, let a pie rest for at least 3 hours before diving in, coffee for the morning and whiskey for the evening, driver picks the music…

A motorcycle shot past him. For a moment it sent him back to the notebook but something off about it brought him back. Why was an older black woman riding, without a helmet or jacket, behind a young Vietnamese man?

As the question finished formulating in his head he knew the answer. Psychopomp at work. Though his hands were still shaking, Dean put the Impala back in drive and followed Sixth down to New Hampshire until he found himself at the Obolus Café. Sure enough, beyond the window Castiel sat at a table with the old woman who was drinking from a golden mug.

It occurred to Dean, as he got out of the Impala and walked up to the door, that usually he either stumbled into the Obolus by accident or only after a long period of being a sissy. Ironic that he was going right up and knocking only because his brain decided to become a hurricane. Though perhaps that counted as a long period of being a sissy.

Castiel looked up from his conversation and opened his eyes wide, micro-tilting his head curiously. He turned back to the woman and spoke for a few moments; they laughed, and then she turned to look as Castiel got up and walked to the door.

"God, no…," Dean gasped. Missouri Mosley, his family's next-door neighbor, was drinking her last pick me up. This night was fucking hell.

Cas unlocked the door, "Technically-" he said but Dean shoved him out of the way to get inside.

"Ms. Mosley?!"

"Dean Winchester!" She crooned. She got up from her seat and grabbed him into a deep hug, shivering slightly at its end. Dean stood there for a moment: when did she last hug him? …When his mother died. Fucking hell.

Missouri pulled back and smacked him on the side of the head.

"Ow! What the hell-!"

"The hell, what the hell indeed, boy!" She yelled. "What kind of idiot thing did you do to and get yourself killed for!? You were so young, your parents worked so hard to do you well and then you go and get yourself dead at twenty-five!? At least I had diabetes, Dean, I knew my time was comin', but you," she smacked him again. "You stupid idiot!"

"Gah- Wait, wait, Ms. Mosley, I'm not dead!"

"Horse-shi—," she cut herself off, suddenly frowning. She grabbed Dean's hands and pressed her cold skin against him, then grabbed his chin and stared angrily into his eyes. Then the anger passed. "Hunh… well… you've always been a weird one, Dean, I'll give you that."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Dean asked. He looked over to Cas, standing in front of the door with his hands in his beige robe. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Ms. Mosely and Cas shared a look. "I'm not supposed to tell him am I?" She asked. Cas shook his head.

"This night could not get any freakier," Dean mumbled.

"Oh honey, if only you knew…," Missouri said, taking his hand in hers. Then her mouth slanted. "If only you knew a lot of things, really…"

"Why don't we sit down?" Castiel implored, pushing the other two back to the table. Missouri gave Dean a smile and squeezed his hand before returning to her golden cup. "You too, Dean," Castiel said softly, resting his hand on Dean's back briefly, slightly below his shoulder blades.

"Hey, uh," Dean said, pulling away slightly. "You… you gotta minute? I don't wanna, uh, interrupt or anything, you know? This-"

"I have many minutes, but they come after this minute," Castiel replied quietly. "You two seem to know each other… this may help, actually."

Help who? Dean almost spat. Almost. But he was tired in more than one sense, so he followed Cas to the table, sitting down next to someone whose permanent absence in his life was starting to make his chest ache.

"Word of advice, Castiel," Missouri said, holding her cup close to her lips. "This boy loves pie. I can't tell you why but it doesn't matter what's in in, if it's pie he's an adorable little boy all over again instead of this handsome old thing."

"I'll remember that," Castiel replied with a light smile. Missouri smiled too and took a sip of her drink. "Grace has truly found you tonight, Ms. Mosley."

"Maybe it has, maybe it hasn't, but like you said, this ain't the end, not really," Missouri said. "And now I got to see a nice face before I get going. That's a nice way to start this intermission. No reason for me to get all bent out of shape about it."

"What?" Dean said. "Ms. Mosley… this ain't like you. I mean… you're a fighter, and you're just taking this lying down?"

She frowned at him. "Taking this lying down? Dean, honey, I'm dead. Lying down's the only way this goes."

"Up until a few days ago I'd have said the same thing," Dean said, trying to ignore Castiel's worried look. "But, hey, look - - you know about all this psychopomp stuff and souls, right?"

"Duh," she replied.

"Then- - wait, what? You knew about all this?"

"Wha-? Boy, no!" She shot back. "That boy that picked me up explained the basics, and then this nice man's been filling me in on the rest. You know I catch on to things pretty quick, and this Castiel fellow explains things nicely. I've got the jist, and that's all I really need."

"What about your life?" Dean said. "I mean come on! What about making those psycho people put your soul back?"

Missouri leaned back in her chair and laughed, downing the rest of her drink.

"Dean," Castiel murmured. "That's not how this works. Psychopomps only collect souls that have disconnected from their bodies. They can't pull a soul out of someone or put it back in..."

Dean glared back.

"Hoo… and you thought I was the one who'd need a talking to?" Missouri mused. She pushed herself back from her chair. "Thank you, Castiel, really dear, you were just what the doctor ordered in all this… I'm ready."

"You sure?" Castiel asked.

"What?" Dean blurted out. "But you just-! No, wait, c'mon-"

"Yes, I'm sure," She said, standing up. Castiel moved towards the back of the café but Dean gripped his arm.

"Now wait just a second," Dean's voice cracked at the end. He glared between the two of them for a moment before saying. "There's gotta be some way to put her back. You're the intern, you outta know how, so put her back!"

"What are you getting all worked up about?" Missouri said. "I kicked it, honey, you can't unkick anything."

"Bull crap, this whole, this big soul reaping harvest thing," Dean muttered. "There's gotta be a way to stop it, so fucking stop it!"

"Honey," Missouri said, stepping forward and taking Dean's hand. He shook it off. She frowned. "Dean Winchester, what's wrong?"

"What's wrong?! You're dying's what's wrong!" Dean shouted. "Everyone's dying dammit!"

"…Yeah, I'm dead, everyone's gonna be one day or another," she replied. She sighed and took his hand again. "Look… you're a good kid, baby, you're such a good boy that's had a whole lotta shit thrown at you."

She grabbed both his arms and pulled him so he had to stare into her eyes. "But don't you get stuck in all that now. There are hell years, baby, and there are heaven years and there are some years thrown in the middle somewhere. And those Hell years, they aint easy. But you know what they say about hell, dontchya?"

"Ms. Mosley…"

"Answer me, boy, I aint got forever."

Dean gasped sharp air, so sharp it stung his eyes. "…You keep on walkin'."

"That's right, baby, you keep on walking," Missouri said. She let go of his arms and patted the sides of jacket gently, starting to tear up herself. "You may not like something that happens, but don't regret it, just let the matter be and keep growin', you hear?... I said you hear?"

"Y-yes ma'am," Dean said. Dammit, too much. His face was breaking down, this was too much, he couldn't take this again, not another mother, no, God of all Gods.

"Now gimme a hug before I go," She said, and didn't have to ask twice. Castiel took a small step backward and bowed his head as Dean held on to Missouri for her dear life, hoping he could keep it with him.

"Shh, baby, it's okay, shh,"

"I'm so sorry, Ms. Mosley," Dean whispered.

"It's okay, honey, really,"

It felt like minutes when Castiel finally cleared his throat. Dean glared at him, wishing he could use every memory of Missouri meeting Mrs. Winchester over the lawn to share pie recipes as incendiary bombs against this wing-tattooed jackass. So what if he'd had his whole family knocked off at once? It wasn't like this, watching everyone who you ever thought cared about you fly away one by one, never knowing which was going to leave him next.

"Whew," Missouri said, wiping her eyes with her hand. "Whew baby, gone made me a mess."

"If you're ready Ms. Mosley?"

"Yeah, yeah I'm ready," She said. She took Dean's hand and led him with her as Castiel guided them back to the back of the shop, lifting the divider for them. Dean expected the barista to tell him he couldn't come, but blue-eyes said nothing, just led the way to what looked like a storage room.

Castiel flicked on the light to the peach colored room with wooden shelves full of teas and coffee beans and who knew what else. He unlocked a metal cellar door, opened it, and held out his hand to Ms. Mosely. She nodded once and squeezed Dean's hand again, though this one felt more born out of fear than consolation.

"You keep your head up, Dean," She said, looking up at him. "I don't want to see your chin draggin' in the dirt next time I see you."

Dean scoffed and shook his head. If he were a tough guy he'd smile at that. He couldn't smile. He shook his head slowly, staring at the distant nothing between Missouri and Castiel.

"No, really honey, I got a feeling we'll be seeing each other real soon, and not in the way that means you gotta die too."

"Let me guess, you've got one of your feelings?" Dean monotoned.

"Am I ever wrong?" She shot back. After a moment he shook his head slightly, the best lie he could give her.

"I'll see you soon, then, little Winchester," She said with a full smile. One more hand squeeze, and then she was off in Castiel's arms. Blue-eyes helped her down the steps slowly, and Dean hated it, all of it, this whole fucking deal, this whole fucking everything.

And then… he heard her humming. Dean stepped forward and peered down the steps. They were already out of view.

A goodbye kiss. It's the thing Dean never gave his mother before the doctors swooped in to scoop out her organs. He hadn't even thought to give it to Ms. Mosley- - he ran down the stairs, trying to shake the memory of those dry roses out of his head, and started running down the dirt path heading north until a hand shot out and grabbed him.

"Well, if it's not Robocop himself," Meg said, jumping in front of Dean and pushing him back. He tried to dodge around her, but she mirrored him perfectly. "Sorry big boy, but you can't go any farther then where you are now."

"No, I know her, I forgot to-"

"I said it once, and I'll say it again," Meg said slowly. "Sorry, but you stay here."

"But I-!"

"Were you dropped on your head as a kid or something?" She said, crossing her arms. "You. Here. Not there. Here. Staying. Not moving. Ya getting any of this?"

"Look you psycho bitch, you outta-"

"We-he-hell, and you kiss your momma with that mouth?"

Dean glared at her, wanted to knock her snotty little head off with a golf club. But his anger shivered for a moment before petering out. Almost no sleep two nights in a row –or was it three?- and going from bewildered to pissed to freaking out to having his heart go through an industrial strength garbage disposal as yet another caring soul left him… his fight was done. "Fuck you."

"I'd like to see you try," Meg smiled. As Dean slowly took a step back, and Meg let herself lean against the wall, he could hear the humming again. No, now it was singing. At first he thought he knew what it was, that old country song about going through hell and keep on going or whatever, but he quickly realized it wasn't that at all.

"Uh… psycho bitch, do you know what she's singing?"

"Come on Dean, I know your name, you could least salvage the last little bits of worthwhile chivalry your species possesses and call me by mine."

"Heh, yeah, or you could bite me."

"Kinky," Meg said. "But no thanks."

They watched in silence for a few moments again. In the distance Dean could make out a bright opening at the end of the hall with golden light coming from it, along with the sound of rushing water.

"Oh yeah, I do know this song. Oldie but goodie," Meg smiled. "It's Eyes on the Prize."

Dean said nothing, only watching the last woman he could rely on, however sporadically, vanish into the light. Her song flickered out.

It only took a minute of hearing distant water running for him to want silence. Dean took several harsh breaths before turning and walking back to the steps. He heard footsteps behind him. "Leave me the fuck alone."

"Chill, I'm just doing my job," Meg replied coolly. "How'd you know her anyway? Last time I checked weren't white men supposed to not get along all that well with women of color?"

Dean paused on the steps for a moment. He should explode, but he had nothing left to use as internal explosive material. Save an idea. He launched himself up the stairs, and sure enough he heard Meg bounding up behind him.

"What? Come on Robocop, how'd—" He got to the top of the steps and slammed the cellar door closed behind him, and not a moment later did he hear a loud clang and a see a small dent pop out in the metal. This was followed by the unmistakable sound of a body tumbling down a flight of steps.

When he heard a loud "OW, MOTHER-FUCKER!" from below Dean threw a victory a massive punch and yelled back, "How's that for doing your job bitch!"

It was lame, but frankly fuck it all.

Only a few moments and thumping sounds later the metal door flew open, and Meg, as well as a very large, red lump on her forehead, glowered at him from beneath.

"Really?" Dean laughed. "You think you can make tonight any worse? Heh, c'mon, let's see you try!"

A hand appeared on Meg's shoulder. She sighed angrily and rolled her eyes, but stepped out of the way for Castiel to step forward. He carried his robe in one arm, wearing a short sleeve, white v-neck shirt and long, striped sleeping pants which looked wet around the ankles. "Thank you Meg, there's some ice in the freezer for your head."

"Yeah, I know," Meg replied. "It can also hold the head of an ass-face if you clear out enough space-"

"Thank you Meg," Castiel ordered. Dean was used to hearing the barista speak calmly or kindly, sometimes even playfully, but never authoritatively.

God there was just too much happening in one night.

Meg stepped up the rest of the way into the storage room, glaring at Dean, and walked off through another doorway. Castiel closed and locked the cellar door. He looked at Dean for a moment, then away at the doorway Meg walked through, down to the Cellar, then back to Dean. "…I don't imagine there is any part of this evening that has passed very pleasantly for you…"

"Heh, no fucking shit, ya think?" Dean slurred. He stepped back, falling against one of the racks of drinkables.

"I didn't realize… if I had known that you and she were close, Dean, I wouldn't have…" Castiel pressed his lips together, wringing his robe between his hands.

"Dude, just stop," Dean said, shaking his head. "You just look stupid."

Castiel's apologetic gaze hardened into a frown. Good. Dean knew how to handle angry people. A set of simple rules.

"This has nothing to do with looks, Dean," Castiel growled. "I'm trying to apologize for putting you in a painful situation… again."

"Save it man, really, it's just kinda, you know, the whole unaverageness running around here."

Castiel shut his eyes in a wince, but it felt good to Dean. Someone else gets to feel some pain for once. Instead of him. Nice.

"You're resorting to slander again," Castiel said, taking a breath. "You only do that when you're in pain."

"Heh, oh yeah, you go ahead and think that," Dean sniffed. "See, you don't know anything about me, man. I'm just an ass. And you, heh… you're just some supped up, perfect little pretty guy with a few fancy words and flirts and shit, a job that's a bit cooler than some high-schooler's part-time gig, and an over active caring organ somewhere inside you. And me? Hah, nothin' in common with any of that. You can't fucking know me."

"…You're good at this," Castiel whispered and swallowed, still clutching his robes.

"I'm good at a lot of things," Dean shrugged. "But's it's not like—"

"For the love of everything holy and beautiful in the world would you STOP!" Castiel shouted. There was a clatter in the room Meg walked into, which Dean presumed was the kitchen. "I know you slander and bully people when you're in pain because that's why anyone slanders or bullies people! And gracious Dean, you knew the woman when you were a child, she was telling me about how she looked after you and your brother when we were at the river's edge, and the way you two were speaking to each other… only the monsters in the deepest caves of hell wouldn't feel incredible pain to go through what you just went through!"

"Well I'm a monster then, sorry to fuckin' disappoint!" Dean yelled.

"No, what you are is a terrible liar," Cas shot back. "You're not a monster, Dean, and you know it! And I never claimed to know everything about you, only parcels-"

"Save it, pretty boy, you don't even care about me or any of this, you-!"

Castiel grabbed Dean and shoved him back again the racks, staring directly into his eyes.

"Remember two days ago? You wanted to know why I care? I told you I didn't know why but I wanted to keep getting to know. Well, unlike you, Dean Winchester, I'm a very good liar. Of course I know why I care about you; I care about you because you get it. When you see too much death but death keeps coming to your door to pull away everything and everyone you ever cared about, no, ever even had an opinion about, it rips you apart, and then their ghosts don't let you sleep or even know peace!

"But it can be worse still, because I have to stew in the knowledge that this was my fault. I was the one that started the civil war in my family and I couldn't stop it, and I'm the one that abandoned all of my friends not once, not twice, but three times, Dean! My entire makeshift family in the church, then my allies the city, the only people who thought that I was worthy enough to one day go to heaven so they inked on me their gift of wings, and then those beautiful people in the reform movement, I lost all of them! Not just my family, but everything! You know how incredibly impossible it is to find someone who could possibly understand to lose everything repeatedly!

"I never thought that I would ever be able to share anyone's company again and mean the smile I put on my face. But then you walked in the door and I made a guess and I took a chance asking you a question and then I realized I found someone who understands how much crap there is to all of THIS!" He waved his arms wildly around, signaling the café, the cellar, the sky.

Castiel seethed for a few moments, dropping his arms and catching his breath. "And then you showed up tonight, after things were finally calming down, and I saw something was haunting you, but then I let you in and…I ruined everything again."

There was no fight left, only the raw Dean.

"Are mommy and daddy getting a divorce?" Meg called out from the room with the freezer. Castiel sighed and looked away, taking a step back from Dean and picking up his robe from where he dropped it.

But Dean breathed a small laugh and whispered a smile.

Castiel glanced at Dean for a moment cautiously before saying, "I apologize… for continuing to cause you emotional pain… and for shoving you into Colombian coffee."

"It…," Dean started to say, but he didn't know how to finish that sentence. He closed his eyes. Dean shook his head, pressing at the bridge of his nose for a moment and then covering his face with his hand. What the hell was this? This life thing, this death thing, this simple complexity?

"Shall I," Castiel began, standing near the doorway back to the front of the café. "Leave you to show yourself out?"

Missouri Mosley was dead. Ish. The darkness was making Dean relive the start of the end three years ago. And who knew whether his brother had left any more gifts of guilt on Dean's phone. "No…," Dean said.

Castiel frowned. He looked down at his balled up robe, and his face slowly softened. "I'm sorry for yelling at you before," He said.

Dean opened his eyes and stared up at the ceiling, shaking his head. "God you're right."

"…Yes, I am sorry for-"

"No, no Cas, I mean you get it. This sucks… I dropped out of my 'friens' radar, watched my brother drift away, then my Mom got sick and lost her mind, then my dad died, then mom… and the person I thought was my everything," He killed her, but he couldn't say it. Deep breathes. "And now I can't do what I'm good at, I just fix cars and pick up the dead bodies off the road. It's like… you just go through the motions, hoping that no one gets close enough to notice that you're not there at all… And now Ms. Mosley, God why'd it have to be her?"

Dean's face was threatening to break again. More deep breathes. Bite down hard. His eyes reddened and wetted but didn't shatter. Suddenly he felt something warm next to his left arm – he looked over and found Castiel leaning against the rack next to him, staring off into the same nothingness Dean was watching a moment before. He smelled of cinnamon and butter, which got stronger as he leaned against Dean's shoulder slightly. It took a moment for Dean to realize Castiel wasn't trying to use him as support, but rather offering it. Dean leaned into Castiel in return, gulping in hard chunk of air.

"She seemed real peaceful on the way down," Dean said after a moment to hold back any hiccups.

"She seemed like it, yes," Castiel replied. "But she was also very scared. Really, I think the people who do the best are the one's that feel that fear but keep walking. And… I think when she saw you she realized that she had something to do. Before you came in she was asking me to make sure all the people she cared about in her life had someone to watch over them… and I couldn't promise that, and I worried it would build regret in her mind. But then she saw you, and she saw we knew each other… and she knew that… well, I don't want to be guilty of vanity, but I think she knew that we are familiar enough to try to watch out for each other. And knowing that, and knowing that you loved her… I think that made her brave."

"Dammit," Dean said. His eyes broke, and the crying started, quickly turning hot and messy. A few moments in and he felt Castiel rubbing the spot between his shoulder and his neck, but blue-eyes said nothing. A few moments longer and Castiel's arm wrapped around Dean's shoulders and turned him in towards Castiel's body. Dean's head landed next to Castiel's neck, but he didn't try to complete the hug or say anything. Dean grabbed onto Cas's shoulder, but that was all. They simply leaned on each other.

(Panting)… okay… so I missed the Wed/Thursday update schedule. 1. Grad school just EXPLODED in my face. And not in the good way. 2. I wrote this chapter once, then completely rewrote it… and then the damn thing just kept going…

You may assign a punishment for my tardiness. What may this punishment be? Idunno, you tell me. Write a short smut scene? Work a mickey-mouse umbrella into the plot? It's up to y'all.