Chapter Text
The brothers called it his 'Angel Inventory'. He didn't quite get the name, but it seemed to make them laugh, and that was enough. They had first discovered it when they were at a launderette one day - one of the few days that things were calm, where life admin could be done without fear of something (everything) trying to kill them.
Cas seemed to enjoy these days more than others, sometimes, Sam might've remarked. He watched everything with such intense curiosity, it was like he was studying to write his thesis on them later.
As it was, today they were in a laundromat. Sat on the hard, unforgiving plastic stools, they tried to busy themselves with banter (more so the brothers did, than Castiel himself - watching as intently as ever). Sam sat opposite Castiel, arms folded across his chest, feet planted firmly on the ground. He didn't quite fit in the chairs, and a brief twitch of a smirk graced Cas' lips at the thought. Dean was sat on Cas' right, one foot crossed and resting on his opposite knee, and if he allowed himself to think about it, was possibly even leaning closer to Cas than could surely be comfortable. He didn't think about it too hard, instead feeling a vague sense of comfort at the closeness of their shoulders together - almost, but not quite, touching. Eventually the patter trailed off, leaving a semi-comfortable silence and the background thuds and whirs of the machines as they worked - hard - to clean their bloody and worn clothes.
Cas grew bored of watching eventually; had heard enough of the continuous spin cycles, the soft sighs and throat-clearings of Sam and Dean as they shifted in their seats, forever unable to get comfortable in the too-small, hard plastic chairs.
He held out a hand, palm raised open to the ceiling, and twitched it ever so slightly. A small book (a crossword puzzle book to be specific) appeared in his hand, with a smart pen on top of it. In the edges of his vision, he could see the brothers share a look between themselves - as they are so often wont to do, having entire conversations it seems without speaking a word. He paid no mind, no one said anything so the angel said nothing too, instead burrowing back into the chair he inhabited slightly. He opened the book, flipping to the latest dog eared page, and focusing down to his puzzle.
He lost himself in it quickly; his vague awareness of his surroundings dimming as he focused onthe fun little words and boxes. Castiel found he enjoyed crosswords. As he acclimated to the current societal setting, he found the answers and clues both simplistic and confusing in their own right - but he enjoyed them none the less. His tongue stuck out slightly between his chapped lips, as he moved to scratch the answers onto the page.
After a short while, he heard Dean deliberately clear his throat next to him. Cas turned to him, on his right, deft fingers holding the pen hovering above the page. Dean appeared to have an... incredulous (?) look on his face. He was still getting to grips with expressions, especially Dean's. Just like the puzzles, they could be so clear to him at times, and at others seemingly beyond his grasp of understanding.
"What the hell was that?!"
Dean's voice matched his assumed facial expression, and Cas felt somewhat pleased that he had identified it correctly. In response to the question, he tilted his head on its axis slightly, looking all too much like a curious puppy.
"The.. the book!” He stammered, continuing - “You just what, poofed that out of thin air..?!" He mimed an explosion with his hands to enunciate his point, and a slight warmth crossed Cas' steely blue eyes for a moment as he looked at him.
"Yes, Dean." Cas answered slowly and plainly - clearly feeling as though it was of no special attention required, like it was obvious.
"From where, Cas? Is that more of your angel mojo? You know how I feel about that." Dean made another face - perhaps this time one of distaste, or disdain - presumably about the use of 'mojo' as he so called it.
"I suppose, if you would like to call it that, yes." Cas shifted in his seat to look at Dean more face on - and flitted his eyes between Sam and Dean both. "It sort of resembles.. a green room. A storage space, if you will." Sam leaned forward on his chair, elbows resting on his arms and hands folded in front of his face now.
"So..." Sam begun, "It's like an inventory? Angel inventory? And you can just, access this anywhere, anytime?" His eyes were slightly widened, intrigue showing clearly across his face.
"Yes." A none-too-awkward silence fell over the trio, Sam and Dean apparently sharing more unspoken words across it. Cas moved to return to his crossword, feeling the matter was clearly settled.
"Why'd you need that? What do you even keep there?" A soft sigh escaped his lips as Dean's questions resumed - he had been wrong. It wasn't exasperation, more so confusion about why this was so intriguing to him - to them both, apparently. He placed the book upside on his lap gently, using his knee to keep his place.
Cas shrugged slightly, an unfamiliar gesture on his inhuman form. He decided to answer the first question first, "Well. Where else would I keep my belongings, Dean?"
He paused as he let the information sink in, closely watching Dean's face as his brow furrowed slightly. "I don't have a home here. I don't have a car. I have no need for these, and yet I still have items I cannot carry on my person at all times, but cannot be stored in Heaven." Sam appeared to be nodding opposite them, but Dean kept a furrowed expression, almost a frown. Unreadable. A slight flush entered Castiel’s cheeks, as he began to consider the second question.
"As to what I keep there, well..." He trailed off, eyes shifting away to the wall of the laundromat. The thrum of the machines filled in what would otherwise be quiet around them, and he let his eyes unfocus somewhat as he considered the few belongings he had.
He truly didn't have much - he never had a need for many things; belongings or the like. His weapons fit easily alongside his vessel, stored with his grace in the same way his wings were tucked out of sight on another plane. Except, since meeting the Winchesters, he suddenly had more... feelings about things than what he had expected. It had only grown as the relationship between himself and his brethren grew strained. Castiel occasionally wondered what this meant about him - about his faith, whether he was straying too far from the flock, losing something incrementally, without realising it. He found himself wanting to keep items - sentimentality, he believed the concept was called. Items he had no real reason to keep, or want, or need, except he seemed to care for them.
"Well?" Sam's gentle prompt brought Cas back to the topic of conversation, and he twisted his body to face them again, careful not to let the book fall from his knee. Sam now looked curious, and while Dean was still difficult to read, he could see a flicker of curiosity in his eyes too.
Another soft sigh left his lips. "I retained the necklace vial that had contained Anna's grace. It is broken, and yet I returned to the barn after everyone had departed to retrieve it." He dropped his gaze to the floor, feeling... shame (?) to have admitted this aloud. The brothers both seemed to be shocked by this, further serving to deepen his shame. There was no need for him to look at them, to know again about another look they shared above him, around him. He could feel Dean leaning away from him, and despite his sensibility, felt an ache as he did.
"I know. It is... uncomely, for me to covet and keep items such as these. Other angels do not appear to do this - at the very least, they do not discuss it. I-" His words sped up, tumbling over themselves in his haste to explain, to justify himself, and Dean cut him off quickly.
"No, Cas, listen. That's not what we were- Damnit, Cas." He felt Dean tense and release his shoulders in quick succession next to him as he spoke, palms mimicking the same tension and release, frustration bleeding into the edges of his tone.
Cas looked up at him now, deep blue eyes overwhelming with their focus now pinned on the hunter next to him. Dean let out a deep sigh, rubbing his brow bone, muttering under his breath slightly before continuing. "We weren't judging. We were just curious - I never knew you could do ... 'that'." He gestured vaguely in the air to punctuate what he couldn't verbalise, throwing a glance towards Sam as he did. "There's no shame in wanting keepsakes, y'know that, right?" Dean quirked an eyebrow up, matching Cas' gaze. Sam hummed in assent opposite them, nodding with what his brother said, but Castiel's frown deepened.
He said nothing for a short time, musing what he'd heard.
"It is.. not right, for an angel to do this."
His voice was flat, and the statement hung in the air as he turned back to his puzzle book, righting it now to rest again his legs as he opened it back to the saved page. He felt Dean and Sam share yet more looks across him and he briefly wondered whether they knew how overt they were. No matter.
The discussion was over, but he struggled now to focus on his crosswords. He felt unsettled, off-kilter, with the direction this conversation had gone. It was unexpected, and Cas decided he didn't like this feeling - vulnerability. He found it difficult to understand why it intrigued them both so, if it was truly just because they hadn't seen him do this before.
The machines continued to provide the background noise, though there was now undeniably more weight in the air than there had been 10 minutes ago. One of the machines chimed, signalling the end of its cycle, and both the Winchesters moved to begin the next stage. Dean sat down resolutely beside him again; ceding the action to Sam, waving at him vaguely and saying something about how Sam ‘has to pull his weight sometime’, but Cas was only half listening.
He tried to ignore the comfort, the warmth, he felt as Dean's shoulder touched his again, feeling watchful eyes on him briefly, before Dean found something else to focus on.
An angel should not covet, he felt a small voice say inside him.
He knew it was right, but couldn't deny the sadness that tinged him at the thought.
Dean was standing outside another, dingy motel. They had started to blur together in his mind, sometime around the age of 10 - all the dirty carpets, musty bed covers, grimy bathrooms. It was all the same when you really came down to it. Currently, he was leaning against the wall near the far end of the building, a vending machine not too far from where he was.
He held a cool beer in his hand, sipping occasionally, and closed his eyes gently as he leaned his head back against the wall. The cold seemed to seep into his skin, and despite the night being mild, he felt goosebumps prickle across his skin. Soon, he felt a presence near him, heard the accompanying (and almost nonexistent) flutter of wings, as though a flock of birds took flight. He had come to associate the latter with the presence of a certain trench coat wearing, tax-account looking angel.
"Hey, Cas." He greeted the angel, without opening his eyes.
"Hello Dean." Came the gravelly, solid response. Something stirred in his chest at the sound, but he ignored it.
Dean gently bumped his head back against the wall, a low thud sounding out, before he opened his eyes and settled them on the angel. His angel, it seemed lately, as Sam had taken to teasing.
"So, what's it this time?" He quirked an eyebrow at Cas, taking another swig from the bottle as he did. "Sky's falling? Another demon en route to try and kick our asses? Hell planning to reach up and try to grab me back?" Cas could see his jaw tighten as he said the last, and in response cocked his head on an angle - ever so slightly - as he held Dean's unwavering stare.
Cas sighed softly, and moved to lean (gingerly, Dean noted with some appreciation) against the hood of the Impala parked opposite himself.
"No, Dean. This is not.." He trailed off, eyes flickering away, before seeming to regather himself and fixing Dean with that steely blue gaze that was less and less unnerving by the day. "I wanted to see you."
Whatever the hunter had expected, it wasn't that. For a moment, confusion clouded his face, before a slight blush tinged his cheeks and he looked away. He kicked a stone on the ground, slugging more of his beer, grateful he had something else to focus on here.
"Why? You miss me or somethin'?" Dean's classic, smug smirk was in place, looking towards Cas again and almost desperately searching his eyes for something, anything to give him a read on this situation. Sure, Cas had been hanging around them more often than 'normal', recently, but he wasn't stupid. He wasn't hanging out with them for fun. He was probably just keeping an eye on them, making sure Sam wasn't running off doing some stupid shit. That made two of them, watching Sammy, and a second set of eyes was always better than one.
In a way, he hoped that having an angel around, instead of that bitch, Ruby, would keep Sam grounded. On the level.
He tried to ignore the nagging sensation that since he'd come back, he felt like he barely knew his own brother anymore.
Dean snapped himself off the train of thought he'd followed for longer than he liked and refocused on Cas sat directly opposite him, seemingly waiting for him to rejoin the land of the living before he continued to speak.
"I wanted to.. The conversation we had earlier. It bothered me." Cas shifted, trailing off and restarting his sentence, averting his gaze to the floor again. "I would not like for you to think less of me, for this."
Dean couldn't help the snort, and accompanying eye roll, that escaped him at the words. He did feel a little bad, however, when Cas looked up in surprise, eyes widened with shock looking right at him.
"Really Cas? You came here to what, protect your stoic angelic rep?" His lip curled back into a snarl against his choice as he spoke, incredulity creeping in. "God forbid, hah, you seem human at all." He wasn't angry - not really - but seriously, this was just the cherry on the top of the shit cake week he'd had. His laugh was a sharp bark, and he was grateful at least that Sam was asleep in their room.
He tried to ignore that sad, kicked puppy look on Cas' face before the angel looked away again, moving to stand and shuffling on his feet. Cas picked at his hands absently, small twitches as he caught the skin. It didn’t even register to him how often the angel had been avoiding his eyeline today - if he was paying attention, it would’ve thrown him off even more than the conversation topic itself.
Castiel’s voice was quiet, when he answered the hunter’s accusation. "That isn't what I meant, Dean." Dean finished his beer, throwing it at a nearby open dumpster, enjoying the sound it made as it shattered against the side walls. He resolutely ignored the way Cas turned away from him as he did.
"Sure you did. You know, we're all mud monkeys right, ain’t that what Uriel called us?" It was a low blow - Dean knew he probably shouldn't be poking him like this. While he acted like their ally, he knew all too well that Castiel had the strength to... send him back, should he choose.
Hell, Dean thought, bristling at the prospect of a fight, let him try.
He turned now to glare at Castiel, eyes lingering on his chapped lips for just a second too long for his own comfort, before meeting his gaze again. An emotion flashed across the angel's eyes, something he couldn't read, before steady neutrality and control seemed to take over.
Dean's glare softened, shoulders sagging rapidly in a betrayal of his exhaustion, his breath falling tired. He dragged a hand across his face, telling Castiel, "Whatever, Cas. There's nothing to talk about. Just… go ahead and do that disappearing trick you do." Cas opened and shut his mouth, looking like he was going to say something, hesitating. Eventually though, he said nothing, eyes turning down to the ground again. If Dean cared to think about it, he could've sworn the angel looked hurt.
Instead, he leant his head against the wall again, closing his eyes briefly, unsure if he wanted Cas to stay or heed the last thing he’d said. In the disappointing silence that ensued, he soon felt a gust of wind breeze past him, and he carefully kept his eyes closed until he was sure Castiel was gone.
All that his eyes met when they reopened was an empty parking lot.
He sighed, and walked back into the motel room quietly (careful not to wake Sam), to lay down to yet another night of fitful, disturbed sleep.
He hadn't expected the interaction to be simple, exactly, but he certainly hadn't expected Dean to snap at him the way he did. Cas replayed the conversation again in his head as he stood on the roof of a nearby building, trying to work out what he had said wrong.
Which choice of words had prompted such a response? He knew that Dean had been drinking alcohol, though he did not believe him to have consumed so much that his reactions were this heavily impacted.
He considered this, and watched from afar as Dean stood motionless for a spell, before walking back into the room where his brother was waiting for him in rest.
Castiel shifts as he stands in his borrowed skin; vaguely aware of the wind curling at the edges of his trench coat, brushing across the tips of his knuckles, caressing his face. These sensations he feels are so... It's hard for him to put words to it. Of course, he'd seen almost everything the world had to offer, experienced everything from a distance, watched the beginnings and ends of many things. But he'd never felt.
And now he did.
It was wrong - he knew that. But it didn't prevent him from wanting, feeling, seeing, in ways he never could before. Though he hadn't been with them long in the objective sense, he couldn't deny that he had a vested interest here; Castiel doubted whether he was strictly following orders anymore.
A sigh fell from his lips without realising, and he turned slowly to survey the view of the skyline, mixed with buildings, nearby trees dotted amongst them. It bothered him that more and more recently how he was 'acting human' - sighing without intention, picking his skin in anxious habit, feeling these ‘things’.
Unrest curled somewhere deep within him, his vessel, in a way he couldn't explain and wasn't sure he wanted to unearth.
Castiel glanced back at the motel door where the Winchesters lay, a final time, before he left. Going where, he wasn't quite sure, but away from here would do for now.
Days passed, and they did not hear from Castiel, or Uriel for that matter. Dean was getting restless, following the road and taking directions when Sam spotted something worth their presence in the papers. He was snappy, biting back comments at Sam that wouldn't help, trying to ignore the way Sam crept out when he thought Dean was asleep. Hell - he may not even care anymore, whatever he did when he went off with that bitch clearly being more important to him. Sam was his own special brand of annoying too - all quiet brooding and pensiveness, pissing Dean off all the more. It bothered him that Ruby always seemed to follow closely behind wherever they went, but no matter how much he tried to tell Sam, he wouldn't listen to him.
It felt like he was waiting for the other shoe to drop, for the angels to sweep in; tell him he was failing and that they would handle it from here. That they would stop Sam, where Dean seemed unable to pull him back from the edge. Or send him back to the pit himself. He had trouble deciding which scared him more these days.
It didn't happen.
Instead, Dean laid on the lumpy motel mattress, his arm resting under the pillow and fingertip trailing against the hilt of his knife. It reassured him as much as it didn't. He stared unfeeling at the ceiling, tracing dusty patterns in the paint with his eyes and listening to the subdued voices of other patrons outside the room. Eventually, against his brain's refusal to shut off, sleep claimed him and his eyelids fluttered shut.
When he opened his eyes next, Dean didn't recognise where he was.
He was sat in a generic dive bar, no one specific place that he could name, but it felt vaguely familiar - sort of like an amalgamation of all the crappy dive bars he'd seen in his life. He was sitting in a booth in the corner, dim lighting and the dark sun setting outside seemingly hiding the features of the other bar attendees from him. Was it just the lighting, or did the eyes seem almost deliberate in the way they avoided him..?
Dean tried to move his mind on from this trail of thought. Instead, he focused on the beer in his hand; chilled to the touch and his favourite brand. At least there was that, he thought to himself with a low smirk. He'd figured he'd fallen asleep, and this was one of his more tame dreams. Whatever - he took his wins where he could get them, and a boring dream with beer was always better than one full of.. Yeah. No need to tempt fate here.
He raised the bottle to his lips, startling for a moment as a figure appeared opposite him. Dean rolled his eyes, taking in the tan trench coat, barely-tied tie and unkempt hair that sat opposite him.
"Of course," He muttered, bringing the bottle back down on the table with slightly more force than necessary, snapping as he raised his voice to speak to the other. "What, didn't feel like seeing me in person?" It made sense, it did, that this dream was Cas' doing.
He tried to deny to himself the slight relief that settled in his stomach as he watched Cas. This, he knew how to handle. Castiel was here to tell him some new shit, something else that was about to crash and burn, or he was here to put an end to it. Either option, righteous anger was ready to rear its ugly head within him. It was comforting to him - he knew how to be angry, he could fall into it like an embrace of a dear friend he'd gone too long without. It was easy.
The angel (His angel, a quiet voice within him amended), regarded him silently. Dean began to shift on the seat, looking around furtively before returning his eyes to Cas and taking a slow drink from the bottle. He raised an eyebrow, continuing, "Well? You bring me here to talk about something or what?"
Cas watched him quietly, seeming to attempt to commit his facial features to memory before taking a breath, and beginning;
"I do not think being human is wrong, or impure, like you seem to believe I do." Castiel spoke calmly, clearly, keeping his blue eyes locked with Dean's green. He still couldn't read the look he saw there, but Dean thought it might've been something like caution. Like he was stepping carefully around what he wanted to say.
Dean said nothing, so Cas took this as a sign to continue, "Other angels do not act as I do. They do not.." Castiel sighed, eyes flickering closed for a beat and suddenly he looked a lot more tired than he had a moment ago. Dean almost felt bad, looking at the creature sitting opposite him now.
"They do not want, as I do." The angel had seemed to steel himself again, picking up his sentence again with the low tones of inflection that Dean had come to recognise with his speech. "There are concerns that I am becoming distracted. That I am not fit for this role."
The silence hung in the air, and Dean had paused as he went for another swig of his beer.
Castiel's eyes had drifted away, but came back to him with an uneasy intensity as he said the last few words, and it felt as though he was trying to say more than he was. Or maybe he wasn't. Dean was getting pretty sick of trying to read between the lines of whatever dance Castiel was leading him on, the words that swirled around him and tripped him up. He couldn't tell where he stood with him - whether Cas was an ally, or an enemy, whether he cared or he didn't. He joined them when it wasn't 'strictly business', sure, but maybe being an Angel for millennia got lonely, and he just wanted to kill the time. Dean never knew what was happening with Castiel, and it frustrated him as much as it concerned him.
He pulled himself away from his thoughts, regarding Cas with something akin to curiosity.
"So, what? This is your big, 'I'm not like other Angels' speech?" Dean used his hand to mine air quotes as he spoke. “Well guess what, Cas,” he huffed, a small amount of amusement creeping into his tone, lips quirking into an attempt of a smile, “I could’ve told you that one. Hell, a deaf-blind man could’ve told you that.” He levelled a look across the table at the other man, watching him carefully.
It seemed like this conversation was going to be half silence from both of them, so he continued. “Cas, they’re all dicks.” Dean used his hand to sweep across the table, marvelling at the lack of unknown sticky substance on its surface for a moment and debating saying what he wanted to say next.
“Maybe I was a bit harsh last time we spoke. I didn’t..” He groaned, looking away and down at the ground through his lashes. “Listen, I’m no good at this. You’ve been good to us, I know, but it’s weird. This has been a lot to grapple with, and you haven’t exactly been the friendliest bunch - you get that, right?”
He brought his eyes up to catch the impossibly ice blue gaze of Castiel, who hadn’t appeared to move at all since he appeared in the booth, but he could’ve sworn the corner of his mouth twitched in a semblance of a smirk. “I get it, you’re the odd one out - the ugly duckling - it’s not that big a deal though. I don’t get why you’re making it this huge thing. You’re trying, and that’s what matters.” Dean hesitated again, before continuing, “... You’re not like the rest of them.”
Castiel’s face, which had started to soften somewhat, suddenly closed off. It was like a metal shutter had been brought down, violently fast, and he didn’t know if he imagined the previous emotions, or if he was convincing himself of what he wanted to see. He felt his stomach turn, watching Castiel’s form visibly tense, and a cold chill settled over him.
Clearly, he’d said something wrong here, but he had no idea what it was.
“You’re right, Dean.” Cas’ cool tone washed over him, like a bucket of ice water had been dumped over his head. “I apologise for disturbing you.” The angel stood to leave, stepping out of the booth they were in, keeping their eyes locked. His back was straight, shoulders rigid, face a completely blank slate. Dean started to reach out to him, unsure of why or what he would even do if he tried to touch him, the aborted movement leading to him sat half in, half out of the seat. Confusion flared on his face, and he frowned, looking up at Cas. “Cas, look, I don’t know wha-” He was cut off abruptly however, by the wave of a slender hand. “I did not mean to get so caught up. You are right - this is not ‘a big deal’.” Slim fingers curved in the air, miming quotes.
For a flicker of a moment, he looked despondent, Dean thought, before the mask was replaced just as quickly as it had fallen.
“C’mon Cas, just sit back down, I didn’t mean to-”, he almost pleaded, and fuck, this wasn’t how he meant this conversation to go. He had been ready to rip the angel a new one not 10 minutes ago, and now here he was practically begging him to stay.
“Stop, Dean.”
He stopped, obeying implicitly at the tone in Castiel’s voice.
“I will see you again soon.” He paused one last time, now avoiding Dean’s eye and instead looking across his shoulder, to a distant point, and when he continued, his voice was softer somewhat, the deep timber twisting Dean’s gut. “Rest well, Dean.”
Cas was gone in a blink - and the hunter fell back into an uneventful sleep. When he woke the next day, he’d struggle to remember this conversation in its entirety, struggle to pin down exactly what irked him so badly, what exactly he said that bristled Cas so much. He’d try to shrug it off as he showered, brushed his teeth and shaved, but it would linger like a bad taste, clinging like smoke clings to their clothes after a salt-and-burn.
All he knew was that he’d misstepped, badly, and he didn’t even know what he’d said wrong.