Chapter Text
After Cas gets snatched, Chuck gets beat, and Jack gets promoted to the new god, Dean drives the speed limit, he fully cooks his burgers, and he keeps to a max of two (three) drinks a night.
Sam says it's healthy. Says he's honoring Cas' sacrifice by being more careful with his life. And yeah, that's the goal. That’s the whole point. Because if he doesn’t, then all that loss, all that unbelievable stuff Cas said to him, it’ll have been for nothing.
Dean looks both ways before he crosses the street between the donut shop and convenience store in town, he doesn't go home with the hot woman at the bar who looks like trouble and a good time in equal measure. She probably wasn’t dangerous, not really, but it just doesn’t seem right. Not when Cas—he's being careful, that’s all it is.
When he gets wind of a possible case in Ohio—something vaguely familiar involving skeleton masks and tongues ripped out—he passes it off to a couple of hunters ten years younger than him instead of insisting he and Sam take care of it themselves. Call it gut instinct. Better safe than dead.
It starts freaking Sam out.
“Look, I get it,” Sam says over breakfast. “The jogging, the beer instead of whiskey, the oatmeal—I think it’s great. I do. But are you...are you alright? Are you going to be happy, like this?”
“Not really shooting for ‘happy.’ Best I can do is ‘alive,”’ Dean says, grimacing around a sip of unsweetened black tea. Awful stuff. Worse than water, and that’s saying something.
“Jesus, Dean.”
“What do you want me to say? That I’m getting better? I’m not getting better.”
“I know. I mean, I thought—” Sam rubs at the space between his eyes. “I don’t know what I thought.”
“You remember what it was like last time I—last time we lost him.” His fist bloodied against the backdoor to a fast food joint, an abandoned hospital full of ghosts and a too-casual trip to visit Death with the thin excuse of doing it for a case.
“That’s what I mean. You were—you weren’t good, then.”
“You can say it, Sammy. I was a little worse than ‘not good.’ But the thing is, I’m not good now either. Difference is, I’m trying this time.” Sam looks like he might cry, which doesn’t help anything. “I owe him that.” He doesn’t say his name. Can’t say his name.
“Is this what he wanted though?”
“Man, I’ve got no fucking clue what he wanted. He wanted to tell me he loves me but I don’t think he thought much past that. He wanted us to beat Chuck. We did. Now I just gotta keep going, keep at it until—whenever my clock runs out, I guess.”
“Fuck,” Sam says. And that about covers it.
“You don’t have to stick around for it,” he makes himself say, rather than something embarrassing like the truth: I really hope you stick around for it. “I’m a sad sack of shit, I know that. But you aren’t my babysitter.”
“Do you need a babysitter?” Sam asks, not unkindly. The question sounds glib, but Dean knows better.
“No. And I—I’ll let you know if that changes. Promise.”
Sam nods, serious, and they eat in silence for a bit, staring into their phones. Dean tries not to think about how much he hates oatmeal, but kicking ass at Fruit Ninja can only distract from so much.
At the kitchen sink, Dean dries and Sam washes. It’s companionable, and Dean’s grateful, he is. So fucking grateful for it. He should probably tell Sam that more. Or at all.
“Thanks,” he says, gruff and self-conscious. It’s not enough—he knows that.
Sam bumps his shoulder against his, friendly. “Maybe we could—I don’t know. Do something fun for a change,” he says as he dries off his hands on a fussy embroidered towel Cas had picked up at a craft fair up in Wyoming after a hunt. Something hot and sharp twists inside Dean at the sight, even though evidence of Cas is fucking inescapable everywhere he goes regardless. He might not have a handprint on his shoulder anymore, but he carries Cas on his skin anyway.
“Pickings are kind of slim around here,” Deans says. “Not really feeling like bingo night at the VFW.”
“Then we drive a little. Hey, what about Six Flags? Eileen was planning on heading back this way once she finishes up this run-of-the-mill haunting over in Indianapolis. What if we met her in St. Louis?”
Dean considers it. When it comes to sweaty crowds vs. funnel cake, funnel cake is always going to win. “What the hell, why not.”
*
Dean’s got spots of powdered sugar on his jeans and a slurpee big enough to take a bath in—this was a good idea. Sam's wearing khaki shorts like the model image of a suburban dad, which Dean gives him no small amount of shit for. Eileen joins in, because like Dean, she’s got only correct opinions, and Sam just laughs it off with an easy arm around her waist. She keeps smiling up at him in a way that gives Dean a feeling between happiness and...something else. He’s almost, kind of, maybe having fun. Cas would approve.
Sam wins at a rigged sharp-shooter game to the surprise of no one but the unsuspecting attendant, scoring an absurdly huge, neon pink panda for Eileen on his first try. She makes Sam haul it around under his arm for no other reason than pure, trollish delight. Dean loves her, and wins her a cartoonishly garish tiara at a dart throwing game to show it.
They check off all the freakiest rides until Eileen begs off at the tallest of the coasters, opting instead to wait for them on a bench next to the exit. At the top of the lift hill, Dean grins at Sam, feeling his heart racing despite himself. Sure, he’s beaten an archangel or two in his day, but even he can’t stifle his body’s reaction to being 200 feet up and ready for the drop. The latch on his seatbelt seems a little wonky, but it's probably fine. These rides are inspected all the time, right?
He’s white-knuckling the seat bar and bracing for the lurch of gravity when he sees something impossible on the maintenance platform, just for a second. He sees someone . Someone who can’t be there. A familiar hand reaches forward, and the world disappears for one disorienting moment, and then he registers the feeling of his feet on steady ground instead of the floor of a shaking roller coaster car. He nearly flat falls on his ass, stumbling and then bracing himself against the edge of a table just before he hits the dirt.
“What the fuck ,” he says, loud enough to earn a scowl from a pair of sunburned parents at the table, just trying to eat their shitty theme park gyros with their too-many kids in peace. “Sorry.”
He backs away from the table, putting his hands on his knees and just breathing for a minute to keep it together. So, he’s seeing things now. And teleporting, apparently. Okay. Weirder shit has happened, right? He shambles back toward the ride’s exit, looking for Eileen.
“What the hell, Dean?” she asks when he taps on her shoulder. “Aren’t you supposed to be—” She points up at the ride.
“Yeah, uh. No fuckin’ clue.”
She takes him by the elbow, grip reassuringly strong, and guides him to a bench. His legs practically give out when he stumbles to a sit, and she rubs his back in soothing circles as he tries to get a handle on his breathing. Anybody passing by would think he was having a moment about the loop-the-loops or whatever, not about having just seen...who he thought he saw.
“Whenever you’re ready,” Eileen says gently, in that voice he recognizes from a thousand stints as a fake FBI agent, local deputy, or member of the clergy. Except this time, he’s the vic. Huh.
As he’s about to explain, as much as he can anyway, how they’re here and having this conversation, Sam nearly runs past them, skidding on the asphalt with a flourish when he spots them that wouldn’t be out of place on Looney Tunes.
“Dean, what the hell happened? One second you were—”
“Getting to that,” Dean says, holding up a hand in a plea for a goddamn fucking second. Eileen keeps rubbing his back, and he’d shrug it off except it feels like the only thing keeping him upright.
Sam drops to a squat in front of him, and now Dean can feel the eyes of the passing masses on him, making a scene next to a Dippin’ Dots cart, for fuck’s sake.
“I...I think I saw Cas,” he says, and it sounds so stupid that he keeps his gaze fixed on a spot on his jeans that’s worn threadbare and about to split instead of making eye contact. “Or something that looked like Cas.”
When he looks up, he gets the joy of seeing Sam’s expression shift from worry to something closer to pity. He’s seen that look enough times to know it well.
“I know how much you miss him,” Sam says, like that’s true, like he has any fucking idea.
He’s about to let Sam hear it, about to unleash all the fury and bitterness that’s been taking root in his head since the night everything went to shit. But then he realizes something—Sam does know. He’s been riding shotgun to Dean’s fucked up feelings for Cas for a decade. He knows, better than anyone.
“Yeah, uh. It wasn’t because of...that. I mean, I saw whatever I saw just before the drop, and then boom, I’m down here. It sure felt like the angel express, you know? Where it feels like you’re maybe gonna start seeing shrimp colors and also like you might shit yourself?”
“Shrimp don’t actually see—” Sam starts, before Eileen kicks him in the shin. “Nevermind. But maybe something else could do that, besides angels?”
Dean shrugs, coming up blank.
He’d thought he was past the denial stage of grief. Cas is gone, he knows that in the hollowed out place that passes for his beat-up heart, but even so, he’s finding it really hard not to argue with Sam. That was Cas. It felt like Cas, anyway. Something familiar he’d be hard-pressed to articulate but feels true all the same.
“Maybe you should ride the coaster again,” Eileen says, squeezing his shoulder, “to see if the same thing happens?”
Dean’s stomach objects—he’s experienced more than enough g force for one day—but he’s on his unsteady feet and headed for the queue line with Sam and Eileen hot on his heels before he can think twice.
Second verse, same as the verse. Click click click as the car heads up the hill, Sam beside him, Eileen in the car behind them this time for moral support and to add another pair of eyes. They get to the peak, and—nothing. Just the perfectly normal plummet down the track to the tune of their fellow passengers terrified and joyous screams, around the loops and hairpin turns until they’re back in the station again. If Dean’s disappointed, he can’t feel it. At least not right now. Maybe next time he’s awake and horribly alone in the middle of the night, it’ll hit him. Cas is still gone.
“Maybe he—” Sam starts saying as the seat bar lifts up and the conductor tiredly tells them that he hopes they enjoyed the ride, please exit to the left.
Dean holds up a hand, stopping him. “Just, don’t.”
The good mood that has prevailed over the day is more or less shot, so they make for the exit. They’d planned to stay over at a motel and head back in the morning, but Dean needs something to keep his hands busy or he’s gonna lose it. It’s a quiet, long car ride home.
*
Dean is getting out of the shower one morning a few days later when he realizes he’s let his hair get too long—almost Sam-level long, which is unacceptable. He considers buzzing it off himself, but what the hell, the barber shop in town probably needs the business. After a shave and some breakfast, he throws a wave at Sam and Eileen on his way to the garage, ignoring the stack of books on the war room table between them. Sam's been praying to Jack and they’ve been hitting the lore non-stop since St. Louis. All it's led to is a big pile of nothing. Jack must've meant it when he said he'd be hands-off.
Tony’s a good barber. He’s got to be pushing eighty, wearing a beat-up black apron and thick-framed tortoiseshell glasses. He asks barely any questions, and does a tidy job on Dean’s neck as the radio plays a steady stream of 1960’s pop. No fuss, no muss, except for how Dean's gonna have “Build Me Up Buttercup” in his head for the next week. When Tony's finished, Dean throws a twenty in the coffee can at the front counter for a tip—after all, who’s still charging $8.95 for a haircut in 2020? He snags a lollipop like the full-grown adult he is, futzing with the wrapper as he steps off the curb to cross the street. A car horn beeps, and he catches a glimpse of Mrs. Hastings, silver hair barely visible above the wheel of her ancient Buick. It’s cutting it a little close, but if he just jumps back—
That fucking feeling again. He catches a flash of blue eyes and gets the barest brush of a too-familiar touch to his forehead and then he’s stumbling into the brick alleyway wall thirty yards away from where he could’ve sworn he just was. He does a full 360 turn, looking up and down the alley for any evidence of what just happened, of who just happened. Nothing. His fingers are shaking as he pulls his cell from his jeans pocket, thumbing over Sam’s contact and waiting for the ring. He leans his head back against the wall and breathes, the world spinning.
“Dean, everything okay?” Sam asks, picking up on the second ring like he’s been waiting by the phone. They always did have a bit of a second sense about one another. Thank god for that.
“Everything’s fine, Sammy,” he hears himself say—Winchester-speak for not being on death’s literal door. “Just, uh. Happened again.”
“Shit, you saw him?” Papers rustle in the background, chair legs squeak.
“No, not really—just the zapping thing this time, didn’t get a good look.”
“And you’re sure. Absolutely sure?”
Dean rubs at his temple with his free hand, scuffs his shoe against the dusty gravel. “Unless I blacked out while crossing the fuckin’ street, then yeah. I’m sure.”
“Okay. Alright,” Sam says, the tone of his voice well-suited to either a crisis or a miracle. “Are you good to drive, want one of us to come get you?”
“Nah, I can drive my own damn car through a lot fucking worse than an angel shuttle hangover.”
“I know you can, but we’re just twenty minutes out—”
“I said I’m fine, Sam.”
“Actually, you didn’t say that. You’re not fine. You can’t be fine. If that was really him...”
“I can drive. I’ll see you at home,” Dean says, trying to give the words an air of finality. He’s suddenly way too tired for an argument.
There’s a pause on the other end of the line, Sam signing with Eileen, no doubt.
“Okay,” Sam says, voice carefully even. “See you soon.”
Dean takes what could generously be construed as the scenic route home, as much as central Kansas can be scenic. The wheat fields are kind of pretty, he supposes. With the windows down, he can hear the warm June breeze swishing through them. There’s no good reason for it, but this is the least lonely he’s felt in weeks. Maybe after all these years and too many tragedies, he’s finally lost the plot. He’s earned the right. But for a second, it’s like—it’s almost like he’s got someone in the passenger seat beside him.
*
Dean is chasing bell peppers and onions around a pan with an old wooden spoon when Sam hops up on the counter beside the stove, long legs dangling like he’s eight years old again rather than close to forty.
“What if we just try summoning him?” Sam asks, and Dean sends hot oil splattering as the spoon skids across the pan.
“If he could be summoned, he’d already be here, right?” That’s what he needs to believe, anyway. He gives the neighboring pot of simmering beans a stir and doesn’t elaborate, hoping Sam just understands.
“Well, I don’t know. Could be there’s something keeping him away. Some reason he’s sort of here and not here. Worth a shot, right?”
“Why not.” Dean flips off the gas, figuring fajitas can wait. The steak can stand marinating another ten minutes. It’s not like this is going to work, anyway.
In the dungeon, Sam has already drawn out the summoning circle. The candles are lit, and the copper spell-casting bowl sits in the middle of the room ready to go with various and sundry herbs and bits of magical brick-a-brac. Eileen is up in Michigan visiting a group of hunters she’s known for years, so Sam has the incantation positions set up in the classic two-person format instead of three.
Sam asks if he wants to read the spell, but the deference is unnecessary. Dean already knows how this is going to go. If Sam is similarly pessimistic, it doesn’t show. With his eyes closed, he gives each memorized word of the spell the weight it deserves, more confident with the Latin and Enochian than Dean is ever going to be.
Nothing happens. Dean claps a hand on Sam’s shoulder once he stands and leaves the circle, squeezes gently. He heads back to the kitchen to start in on guacamole for dinner.
*
He’s about to head out on a beer run on some random Friday night when the keys to the Impala go missing. He could’ve sworn he put them in their usual place, the hook just inside the door to the garage, but maybe he’d forgotten and they’d gotten mixed up in the laundry. Except, no, his jeans are all clean and put away in his dresser, and surely he’d have noticed his keys when he was folding.
He starts checking increasingly improbable hiding spots around the bunker, resorting to the couch cushions in the Dean Cave when Sam ambles through the door.
“What’re you looking for?” Sam asks, around a mouthful of those awful root vegetable chips he always insists on getting at the only health food store within 200 miles.
“Can’t find my fuckin’ keys.”
“You were going somewhere tonight? There’s a tornado warning, dude. Multiple funnel clouds spotted nearby. We’re all good here, obviously, but you probably shouldn’t—”
“Son of a bitch did it again."