Little Life

Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at http://archiveofourown.org/works/38729271.

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Category: M/M
Fandom: Supernatural (TV 2005)
Relationship: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Character: Dean Winchester, Castiel (Supernatural), Charlie Bradbury, Jack Kline,
Amara (Supernatural), Claire Novak
Additional Tags: Fluff, Domestic Fluff, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Mild Hurt/Comfort,
Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Light Angst, POV
Dean Winchester, Castiel and Dean Winchester Being Idiots, Castiel
and Dean Winchester in Love, Castiel and Dean Winchester Live
Together, Protective Dean Winchester, Castiel is Jack Kline's Parent,
Dean Winchester is Jack Kline's Parent, Dean Winchester is Protective
of Castiel, Dean Winchester Takes Care of Castiel, Fix-It, Sickfic,
Sharing a Bed, Human Castiel (Supernatural), Castiel and Dean
Winchester Use Their Words, Castiel Loves Christmas (Supernatural),
Past/Referenced Torture, Castiel Gets a Job (Supernatural), Castiel
and Dean Winchester Behave Like a Married Couple, Angst with a
Happy Ending, Post-Series, Title from a Frank Turner Song, because
my friends and I still say so
Language: English
Series: Part 2 of Windows
Stats: Published: 2022-05-01 Words: 9,373 Chapters: 1/1

Little Life
by cgf_kat

Summary

Dean and Cas have a house and a farm and a new hometown near the bunker. They have
friends and Christmas decorations and plans. But Jack has not yet returned from his efforts
to separate from Amara so he can come home. They know it's just a matter of time, and
meanwhile, they have human lives to live - lives that, just like any human existence, aren't
perfect.

Due to the whole being human thing, they still have things to work on.

It would also be nice if Jack could make it home for Christmas.

Notes

So this was originally supposed to be finished by Christmas, thus the Christmas theme.
That apparently didn't happen, but I didn't have the heart to change it. So enjoy this little bit
 of Christmas in May. XD

(Please note that this is a timestamp to the longer fic "I Just Need You" which you can find
by clicking on the Windows series this is a part of. How Dean and Cas got to this point may
not make sense if you haven't read that, but if that doesn't matter to you that's okay too!
There will be spoilers here though.)

Also, I should mention that Emma is based on a friend of mine and is not a reference to
Dean’s Amazon daughter from season 7.

See the end of the work for more notes

“We do not have enough ornaments and shit for a tree that big,” Dean points out, squinting at the
tip of the preshaped evergreen tree that’s at least a good two feet or more above his head.

There are more ridiculously sized Christmas trees in the world, sure, but their ceilings at home are
only so tall.

“Actually, we have a more than adequate amount of decorations,” Cas says. “There are two more
boxes under the basement stairs that I procured from rummage sales after last year’s holiday
season.”

Dean blinks at him. “That’s what those are? I thought that was just more of your stuff from the
bunker!”

“Dean, when at the bunker did I ever have an overabundance of possessions?”

He shakes his head, giving himself a moment to respond by bringing his warm paper coffee cup to
his lips. “It’s still not gonna fit in the house.”

The fingers threaded through his other hand squeeze gently as if they’re asking. “The trunk can be
trimmed.”

“There might not be room to put something on top even if we do that. And there’s gonna be less
room under it.”

“That’s fine. It will be enough,” Cas shrugs, looking back at the tree with eyebrows up and an
excited smile on his face, and damn him for being so cute. How is he supposed to say no to that?

Dean sighs, stamping his feet in the snow to force some warmth into his toes, but he’s smiling to
himself as he turns back toward the entrance to the tree lot. “All right, I’ll go get the guy.”

It’s not until they’re securing the tree in the bed of the truck and Cas probably thinks he’s not
paying attention that the excitement drains from his face to give way to something else. Dean
watches the emotions flickering there while he tugs on the ratchet straps. Sadness, pain, a strange
sort of hope…

He’s relatively sure he knows what this is about, but he doesn’t try to say anything until they’re on
the way back to town. They brought Cas’s truck for the tree, and to keep the Impala out of the
snow when possible, but Dean is driving because they’re dropping Cas off at work.

So he only has a limited amount of time in which to say anything at all.

“Cas…”

“I’m all right, Dean.”

Dean blows a stream of air between pursed lips. “I didn’t say anything.”

“You were going to.”

“I—” He glances over, stopping at that damn look on Cas’s face. He’s doing it on purpose. The
whole wide, kind of watery eyes and that pleading look. Trying to get him to drop it. Dean tells
himself that if he couldn’t see the real pain behind the sort-of an act going on there, he wouldn’t let
it work on him.

But regardless of what about it all does work, it works this time.

“You know I’m not lettin’ you get away with that forever, right?” Cas only smiles a little in
answer, damn him, but at least it makes Dean feel a little better to see it.

It’s only a few more minutes anyway, and the time is passed with the heater on full blast and the
speakers hooked to Dean’s phone piping music from one of their Frank Turner playlists alongside
the current of typical noise from the running of the old truck

“ And every day I try to make sure I can bring you a little surprise, to help you appreciate our little
fate… ”

He pulls into the small parking lot behind the town’s library, and Cas leans over to kiss him before
he gets out.

“ Don’t try to surprise me by bringing that tree inside on your own,” he says pointedly, laughing
against Dean’s cheek. “You’ll hurt your back. It had better still be there when you pick me up.”

“What? I wouldn’t—”

“Yes, you would.” Cas kisses him again and pulls back to open his door.

The job at the library here in the town they settled near—a couple of hours or so from the bunker
—is just part-time, but Cas loves it. He may not be able to access all of those memories he used to
have as an angel perfectly anymore, but all of that knowledge is still there somewhere. He seems to
enjoy putting it to good use; a few months working there, and he’s already become a popular
source of information and help. Sometimes it’s students from the local school working on projects,
sometimes it’s other things, but it doesn’t matter who it is to Cas. He helps them all just as
enthusiastically.

Dean pushes his own door open and catches Cas’s hand as he comes around the truck to go inside,
twisting in his seat enough to pull him in between his knees. The little employee lot is nearly
surrounded by trees, and a good spot for keeping them out of sight of prying eyes.

Most prying eyes. It doesn’t help when they don’t notice another car pull into the lot and someone
getting out of it.

“Get a room! I don’t want to see old men making out!”

If it were anyone else it might be an insult, but the affection is clear in the laughing voice near the
back door.
“Get fucked, Emma!” Dean calls back.

Cas doesn’t even turn to look, just hauls Dean closer and licks deeper into his mouth this time.
Dean, who is all for that development, throws a middle finger over Cas’s shoulder until his
cackling coworker disappears inside.

“I need to invite Emma over for dinner again next week,” Cas muses, as he combs through his hair
with his fingers after they come up for air.

“Sounds good to me.”

Dean gives his hips one more squeeze before letting him go, this time shoving a hand up under
layers of coat, sweater, button-up, and t-shirt to get at skin with his still-cold fingers and being
rewarded with a yelp as Cas pushes away from him. He gets a glare for it too, thrown back with an
eyebrow, and that’s even better.

The music from his phone is still playing as he pulls back out onto the road of the small town,
having moved on to a different song by now.

“Now who'd have thought that after all, something as simple as rock 'n' roll would save us all? And
who'd have thought that after all, it was rock 'n' roll?”

***

The small farm they purchased is far enough outside of town to provide privacy, but not far enough
to be a hassle. It’s close enough to town that Dean is thinking of using the newer metal building on
the property to open a garage. It was one of the deciding reasons why they settled on this property,
besides the location.

For now, it’s working well as a sizeable shop for himself and a place to park their own vehicles out
of the elements. The plan is to fix up the smaller of the older barns on the property for those
purposes so he can then use this one for a business.

Since they have enough acreage they’re considering using the larger of the wooden barns for a few
cows or something. Or maybe goats? Something with milk.

Dean climbs out of the truck once he’s parked inside the metal building and stares at the tree for a
while, but ultimately decides not to push it today. He’ll wait until Cas is home to bring it inside.

Instead, he goes looking for the boxes Cas was talking about under the basement stairs, and pulls
the box of decorations he already knew they had from the attic so everything is out and ready for
when Cas gets back.

He thinks about starting on dinner after that. Or maybe checking the lights in the boxes to see if
any of them need untangling. But his eyes catch on the green gem on a clear stretch of wall
between the living room and kitchen, and he presses it.

The window opens the way it always does, spreading into an image about the size of a doorway
that stretches down to the hardwood floor. As the rippling surface settles, he makes out the replica
of the TOS Enterprise bridge in Charlie’s basement in heaven. Charlie herself is sprawled in the
captain’s chair with a book.

He doesn’t even have to call out to her. It’s like they always know when someone calls. Like
heaven tells them with that information system Jack installed when he reformed the place.
Charlie looks up and closes the book in one smooth movement, grinning at him as she bounces up
out of her seat and steps up to the outer ring of the bridge to come to the wall she must have the
generator on.

“Hey! What’s…?” She crosses her arms at him. “What’s that face?”

Dean drops down onto the arm of the couch. “Have you heard anything ?”

No point in not cutting to the chase with Charlie; she’d see right through any bullshit anyway.

“Nothing new,” she sighs. “The general, you know, vibe up here is everything’s fine, business as
usual, no problems with whatever they’re doing…you know how it works.”

“Yeah…”

When they’d been waiting for Jack to come back with a way to help fix Cas’s mind, to get the
memories from the Empty out for good, he’d been in heaven then. It was like heaven was telling
him it would be all right. It wasn’t so many words, but he knew Jack would be there in time. He
knew what to do.

“Bad day?”

He shakes his head. “Not exactly. Trying to head one off at the pass I guess.”

They talk for a little while, passing time, catching each other up. But there’s not much to catch up
on. They talk relatively often anyway—she and Bobby take turns swapping the two generators
they have up there back and forth, one which connects to this one that Dean and Cas keep, and the
other which connects to the one Sam and Eileen keep.

They all live such quiet lives now, too. The every day doesn’t often differ much. Dean is more than
fine with that, but it’s still an adjustment sometimes. It’s funny how it hits him at times like this.
When he doesn’t have much to tell.

“It’ll be okay,” Charlie says, before he lets her go. “Jack’s got to be back soon, right?”

Dean just winces. “God, I hope so. It’s been two and half years.”

***

The first Christmas after Jack left with Amara to figure out how to separate them, it had only been a
few months. It was easy to use that as an excuse not to worry. It was easy to tell Cas that…easy to
remind him that even after they did that—or maybe before—Jack would probably want to take care
of the biggest issues with the afterlife before he came home.

Cas was the one who told him, really, that that was probably the holdup. Jack didn’t want anyone
who didn’t have to go to Purgatory to go there. He didn’t want anyone like Kevin stuck wandering
Earth. Among other things.

They had a small celebration in the bunker, just the four of them. Dean insisted. He wasn’t about to
not do something when it was his first Christmas with a human Cas. They were together. It was the
first Christmas of his life where he didn’t have to feel like everything might fall apart around him at
any moment.

It was nice. Small, quiet, and nice. Even if it was just them and Sam and Eileen. Dean prayed, and
he’s sure Cas did too, but no Jack.
“Maybe they’re in the middle of something that’d get messed up if they stopped right now,” Dean
said. “Maybe that means they’ll be done soon.”

Cas smiled at him and he thought it was all right. But sometime that night he woke to muffled
crying from the edge of the bed and all he could do was pull Cas back against his chest and hold
on.

It’s been almost two years since then.

Last year Cas was so set on finding a place of their own before Christmas, but it didn’t quite work
out that way. They closed on the farm just before the holidays but there wasn’t time to move in or
to decorate. They spent Christmas day at Jody’s with her and Donna and the girls and Sam and
Eileen.

That second Christmas was even better than the first quiet Christmas in the bunker, but he’ll never
forget the look on Cas’s face as he stood in their empty new living room before they left for South
Dakota. Like the silent space had betrayed him. Like he was trying to will something to happen,
but nothing did.

On impulse, Dean shoots a text at Claire. You guys are still coming for Christmas, right?

Yeah. Is Cas okay? That’s your worried-about-Cas tone.

He rolls his eyes at the screen. I don’t have a tone. I’m texting.

Whatever you need to tell yourself, old man.

***

Before he picks Cas up Dean makes burgers and puts on Christmas music and turns on all the little
electric candles sitting in the brick fireplace because the chimney still needs repairs before they can
have a real fire safely and he hasn’t gotten to it yet. He still doesn’t know how he feels about them,
but Cas saw the idea online and wouldn’t let it go. If Cas likes them, well, Cas gets whatever he
wants tonight.

Cas, for his part, seems almost surprised that the tree is actually still in the truck when he emerges
from the back door of the library, reading glasses still perched on his nose. His eyebrows go up and
he doesn’t bother to take the things off as he gets in the truck, and Dean is more than a little okay
with that. Cas has had them for a few months now—after spending way too long squinting at
things up close—and god do they do something to him.

Cas knows it, too. Cheeky bastard. He gets in with that smug little smirk on his face because he got
his way and he knows exactly what he’s doing, and it’s infuriating.

It seems like he’s leaning in for a kiss until he calls across Dean and out the open driver’s side
window instead. “Goodbye, Emma! Have a good weekend.”

Dean twists to see Cas’s coworker in the doorway again, waving this time. “Hey you!” Dean calls.
“Food! Our place next week?” He chucks his thumb back over his shoulder.

“Get some extra hinges ready, I’m kicking your door in Thursday. You cooking?”

“You bet I am,” he grins.

“I’ll make sure to keep poison control’s number handy.”

“Ah ha ha,” Dean retorts. Cas is shaking his head at them as he pulls out of the parking lot. He’s
never understood their friendly rivalry over cooking. He seems to enjoy learning those skills from
Dean himself, but he doesn’t care to make it a competition. Honestly, Dean doesn’t even remember
how it started anymore.

But it feels good to have friends that know nothing of the world he spent most of his life in.

It feels good to get these pieces of normal. These building blocks that create the kind of life part of
him always knew he wanted. The kind of life Cas seems happy to share with him, even if it’s just
the two of them.

God, he hopes Cas is happy. Maybe he shouldn’t need to be reminded so often, but he’s only
human, after all. And he’s messed up. So he supposes it makes sense that they’ve made a habit of
squeezing as many of those pieces of normal and happy into every day that they can.

Because they got another chance and they’re not going to waste it.

Dean takes Cas home and feeds him, never tired of the satisfied noises he makes when he eats
Dean’s food or the way his eyes sparkle when he laughs or the way he smirks whenever he catches
Dean staring—particularly when he keeps those damn glasses on.

They wrestle the tree inside and get the trunk trimmed and secured in a stand and it barely fits, but
it’s still worth it to see how happy Cas is about the way it fills up that whole corner of the living
room by the fireplace. They drink and dance and hold each other close between bickering about
what ornaments to put where and whether they want to put garlands or tinsel or both on the thing.

When the tree is decorated, music and dancing gives way to old claymation Christmas specials and
just as many classic singers.

“This guy that wants to be a dentist kinda reminds me of you. Doesn’t want to be like the other
elves,” Dean says. “Does his own thing.”

Cas doesn’t really answer, just sort of smiles, but his eyes look kind of misty when the little guy
gets to be what he wants in the end.

***

Cas is not usually a morning person, even less so than Dean, but somehow even after their holiday
activities extend late into the night, Dean is alone by the second time he wakes. He has a vague
impression of the bed moving earlier in the morning, of the tickling press of lips on his forehead.

He stumbles groggily down the hallway after a stop in their master bathroom and expects to find
Cas out in the living room enjoying the decorations or maybe in the kitchen finding himself
breakfast. But he is neither of those places. There’s a dish in the sink and a cooling half-empty mug
of coffee on the counter.

“Cas?” he croaks, casting his eyes around the open living room, kitchen and dining space. Not that
they have a dining room table yet, but anyway…

There’s no sense of movement anywhere in the house. It feels empty, and it’s a strange feeling he’s
come to dislike. He used to think he liked being alone, or at least that he was fine alone, but he
wasn’t. Not really. Not when Sam went to Stanford and not a single time since.

Weekend mornings should be quiet activity and the warm feeling of knowing you’re not alone. The
telltale signs of breakfast help, but the quiet is weird.
A distinct thumping sound from out toward the porch pulls him out of his thoughts, startling him
into a spin toward the front door and a quick race outside. The boards of the wide porch that spans
the front of the house creak under his bare feet as he leans out to find Cas heading up a ladder that
he’s clearly just moved, dragging a string of lights with him that’s already attached across most of
the front edge of the porch roof.

“What are you doing?” Dean calls, wrapping his robe tighter around himself and curling his toes
against the wood for some warmth. “It’s 8 in the morning! It’s freezing out here.”

Cas glances down with a startled smile. “I thought I would be done by the time you woke up. I’ll
be back inside soon.”

If they had another ladder Dean would help, but they don’t. If he were dressed enough not to catch
something standing out here like this, he would. Cas shifts and the ladder creaks in a perfectly
normal fashion and he should not be worried about this. The thing isn’t new by any means, but it’s
in perfectly good condition and rated for definitely more than Cas weighs and it’s fine .

Something in Dean’s stomach still churns as he retreats inside to find clothes and put on a new pot
of coffee.

It feels like it can’t brew fast enough. He’s standing beside the coffee pot with Cas’s favorite mug
washed and ready in his hands when it finishes. He’s not going to be the guy to try to tell his
perfectly capable partner to get the hell down, but there’s nothing wrong with offering fresh coffee
to coax him back to the ground, right?

He takes two steaming mugs with him back outside, and it looks like Cas is about finished
anyway. So much the better. With real shoes on this time, it’s only a few careful steps out to the
base of the ladder. He doesn’t even have to say anything. Cas either hears him coming or smells the
coffee and after he secures the end of the string of lights to the corner of the house, he’s climbing
back down of his own accord.

That should be that, but it isn’t. Of course, it isn’t. His foot slips halfway down and Dean is
dropping the mugs and coffee into the snow and surging forward and Cas lands practically on top
of him after sliding down the rest of the way with his gloves hands clamped around the side rails of
the ladder.

They both fall back into the snow, and Dean’s heart is in his throat, the air knocked out of him, but
Cas is laughing. It’s almost a wheezing sound at first, like Cas had the wind knocked from his
chest too, but soon enough it’s full-throated and hearty.

“Are you all right, Dean?” Cas asks between bouts of laughter, rolling off of him and glancing
back over his shoulder.

“I’m fine,” he groans, even if something in him is still twisted up in fear.

But he pushes the feeling away because he wants to be fine. He wants to be part of the moment Cas
is having. He wants to laugh. For a moment he thinks he catches something on Cas’s face.
Understanding. Something.

But then they’re helping each other up, and before Dean can look for the discarded mugs he finds a
handful of snow down the back of his shirts. Payback for yesterday.

Cas is already bolting away when Dean shouts, clearly just fine physically after that little mishap.

“That’s the way this is gonna be, huh?” Dean calls.

He goes after him, scooping up a handful of snow of his own, and maybe Cas is doing this on
purpose, but it doesn’t matter. If he is, it’s just part of why Dean loves him.

***

The summer after they bought the house, strangely enough, they spent on the road. The majority of
the repairs needed were done, they were moved in, Jack had not appeared, and Frank Turner was
back in the US on tour.

“We can’t just wait to do all the fun stuff,” Dean said then, in the way of convincing Cas to go at
all when Jack had yet to return. Sometimes it felt like all they were doing was waiting.

He had Cas wrapped up in his arms on the couch in front of that fireplace full of candles.

“I want to take you places, Cas. We could follow the tour, hit some other stuff on the way…hey,
maybe we’d pass somewhere with one of those indoor skydiving places or something.”

“Indoor?”

“Yeah, indoor, cause that’s as dangerous as I’m willing to get.”

“What happened to accepting that human life means danger?” Cas teased.

Dean rolled his eyes toward the ceiling. “You slipped in the shower and almost cracked your head
open literally the week we moved into this place; that’s what happened. If I can die that way or any
other way, you can. Not that I remember when I did, but Sam wasn’t too happy—”

“Dean…”

“Indoors. No real heights. Still fun…so I hear.”

“Dean.”

“You also almost died on me two minutes after I came back and that I do remember; no I will not
let that one go.”

An indulgent sigh. “All right, Dean.”

And those are still his feelings. So maybe they both still have things to deal with.

***

Pressed near the saticky window, Bobby’s hand on his shoulder, trying to see beyond the wall on
the other side that the crate Cas’s generator is stuck to is up against.

Sam and Eileen aren’t close enough. It’s another few hours yet. The window should be closed, was
closed, it would be safer, but he wanted to check on Cas and it opened to this. Just the storage
room wall and thin strips of the dim light leaking in from the sides.

But he can hear everything. Surely Cas just meant to hide the generator; he wouldn’t have intended
this. He would have had to leave the line open so it would just open rather than make noise that
could alert his captors, but he wouldn’t have meant for Dean to be frozen here on the other side,
hearing them hurt him.

Helpless.
Cas’s tired voice, resigned and angry. “If I were an angel, the blade would have an obvious effect
on me other than—” A garbled shout, not the first one he’s heard, and the sound of a blade versus
skin and flesh, but nothing more. No grace-whine, no light.

Because Cas is human now and he can be hurt and he can’t heal himself. Not anymore. And Dean
can’t protect him from here. He can’t do anything…

Dean starts awake, gasping, and it’s been a while since he had that nightmare, but it’s familiar.
That doesn’t help any when he realizes he’s alone again—which makes no sense because he
distinctly remembers falling asleep with a warm body against his. His arms are still searching and
his heart is still pounding in his chest no matter how used to it he should be.

He waits, sure at first that Cas is just in the bathroom or something, willing his pounding heart to
calm. It’s dark, it’s the middle of the night…surely he’ll be back soon. Eventually, though, Dean
rouses enough to realize that the space beside him is cold and there’s no light under the door of the
master bath.

Grumbling quietly, he hauls himself out of bed and pads down the dark hallway looking for signs
of life.

The only light is coming from the living room. Those candles in the fireplace have been turned
back on and he finds Cas curled up in a corner of the couch with the nice photo album Sam and
Eileen gave them last year for Christmas open and slumping off of his lap. It had come with
framed copies of several of the best pictures that now hang in their hallway.

Honestly, Dean was glad for both. He doesn’t know if he ever would have remembered to take the
time to do either of those things. Which Sam probably knew.

The album is open to some of the pages that heavily feature Jack, and Dean can’t help but wince as
he carefully closes it and slides it back onto the coffee table.

“Cas, come on,” he says, prodding his shoulder. It takes a few minutes to rouse him; at one point
he gives up and goes to turn the candles back off instead, coming back to a mumbling Cas feeling
around for his phone on the cushion beside him.

Dean finds the phone first and hands it to him, pulling him up by an arm. “What were you doing
out here? You’re gonna make your eyes worse, you should have at least turned on a lamp or
something.”

The response he gets is unintelligible. He doesn’t make anything out until they’re back in bed and
Cas is curling around him. Dean tried to pull him in first, but a half-asleep Cas was having none of
it, and it’s fine. It’s good. As long as Cas is here and he can feel him and know he’s safe.

“‘M sorry…woke up earlier and couldn’t get back to sleep,” Cas is saying.

“It’s fine, sweetheart,” Dean says with a yawn. At this point, even after the nightmare, he just
wants to go back to sleep. Cas is here beside him and he’s fine. It’s fine.

“You had a dream,” Cas says against his neck.

He lets out a breath and closes his eyes, because of course he wasn’t getting away with not saying
anything. “I’m okay.”

“You were up; you wouldn’t have been up if something hadn’t woken you.”
Dean finds the hands settled against his chest at the ends of the arms wrapped around him and
squeezes them, pushing his fingers between Cas’s in one of them. “Not trying to deny it,” he
mumbles, “jus’ sayin’ I’m okay.”

Cas makes a noise that sounds suspicious, but he doesn’t push. He does, however, press a clumsy
kiss behind Dean’s ear.

Before too much longer sleep drags Dean under again, once the uncomfortable fluttering in his
chest finally settles.

***

Hours later, Sunday morning begins as it should, with Cas smiling from beside him and pancakes
made together in the kitchen and a house full of music.

They clean and decorate the rest of the house because that’s what Cas wants to do, and in the
evening Bobby, Charlie and Mary call from Bobby’s place in heaven for weekend board games.
They set up a folding table against the wall where the window appears and Sam and Eileen have
their own window open from their house on the other side of Bobby’s table. Pamela crashes in at
some point in the middle.

It would be like any other weekend except that Cas gets quieter as the evening goes on, shifting
uncomfortably in his seat and making faces he probably thinks Dean doesn’t see.

***

This time Dean knows exactly where Cas is when he wakes up in the dark, because he can hear the
retching and groaning from the bathroom. The door is wide open, light spilling into the bedroom.

Dean pushes himself up with an arm, trying not to let his voice waver with the tremors still running
through him from the repeated nightmare sudden wakefulness pulled him from. “Cas?”

Another disembodied groan from the bathroom, which is not at all helping him push away the
vestiges of the dream. Dean scrambles from the bed, but by the time he does Cas is in the doorway
leaning heavily on the frame, almost bent over and arms wrapped around himself like he can’t
decide whether to be grabbing at his sides or his back.

“Cas? What hurts?” He knew something was coming. He knew it. Damnit.

“My back? Everything? I don’t…understand,” Cas says. It comes out with no small amount of
frustration, and Dean’s stomach flips at the look in his eyes.

“Okay, okay…” He’s already looking for pants. “Can you put something on?”

“What…?”

“We’re going to the emergency room.” He pushes a pair of sweatpants into Cas’s arms and starts to
pull on the jeans he found for himself. He’s more convinced it’s a good idea when Cas moves out
of the doorway and the bathroom light falls on his face. He looks horribly pale.

Cas shuffles to the bed and slumps onto the edge, clutching the still-folded pants against his
abdomen as if that might help. “Is that necessary?” he says between heavy breaths. “Maybe if I’m
not all right by morning we can just—”

“Have you seen you? We’re going. Get those on and a coat and some shoes and get in the truck,
come on.”

Cas just stares at him for a long moment, until what looks like another wave of pain doubles him
over. Dean moves in to take his arm, holding on until it seems to pass.

“What would even…?” Cas doesn’t finish the sentence. He sounds too tired to.

Dean makes a face. “I’ve got an idea, but you’re not gonna like it if I’m right.”

***

Dean is right. By noon they’re still at the hospital, but at least they have answers and someone is
supposed to be back soon with prescriptions to get them on their way.

“I figured it was probably a kidney stone…sorry,” he sighs. “Welcome to human health shit.”

“I already have eyes that don’t always work properly anymore; that wasn’t enough?” Cas mumbles
against his arm. He’s leaned into Dean who’s perched on the edge of his bed, waiting for the
medication they’ve already given him to kick in.

Dean squeezes his shoulders gently. “It doesn’t work like that. Wish it did. At least this shouldn’t
last long…it’s gonna suck though.”

“I noticed,” Cas groans. “You’ve experienced this before?”

“Yeah…while Sam was at Stanford. Dad was off on a hunt, never even knew it happened. Had to
hole up in a motel for a few days until it passed.” He’s not going to say that he did try to call John,
but John never picked up. He’s also not going to say it was one of the most miserable weeks of his
life.

Cas hears it anyway. He finds Dean’s free hand in his lap and squeezes. “You were alone?” he
asks quietly.

He’s saved from having to say anything else about it by the return of a nurse with the prescriptions
for painkillers and nausea meds they’re going to send Cas home with. The stone isn’t large enough
to cause any other concerns or make them want to keep him. It will come out on its own, and
there’s nothing left to do now but find a pharmacy and go back to the house.

“We can go home now?” Cas asks. He sways a little asking it, but that’s fine. It just means what
they gave him is, hopefully, starting to help.

Dean pulls him closer as he tugs him to his feet. “Yeah, Cas, we’re goin’ home. And when this is
all over you’re cuttin’ back on…everything. And so am I.”

“You and I both know we will never successfully put that into practice.”

“Hey, I can dream, right?”

***

Cas dozes on and off on the way home, rousing more fully when they get home and Dean is trying
to get him back into bed.

“I’m supposed to work tomorrow…”

“I’ll call the library, sweetheart,” Dean assures him, trying to pull up the covers.
Cas holds them off, squinting up at him curiously through a medicated haze. “Will I be better by
Thursday?”

He’s always like this when he gets sick. Asking questions like a kid because he doesn’t have the
human experience to know how any of it works. It’s kind of cute.

“I wish I could tell you; we’ll just have to see. If you’re not, I’ll call Emma too, okay? Now please
get some sleep?”

Long fingers loop softly around his wrist. “Will you stay?”

Even if he wasn’t exhausted himself, how could he say no to that?

***

Dean wakes up sometime in the afternoon and manages to convince Cas to eat some soup, but not
to leave the bedroom. Which is fine. He goes out to the living room to call the library like he
promised he would and ends up on the couch with the TV droning at him because Cas has gone
back to sleep anyway.

Cas pads down the hall to find him later in the evening, ending up across the couch with his head
in Dean’s lap, sometimes curled in on himself and sometimes not, and it sucks but at least Dean can
be here for him. Cas is up and down to the bathroom, certainly, but he keeps coming back, letting
Dean push absent-minded fingers through his hair while they watch old movies.

Well, Dean watches old movies. Cas grabs a pillow from the other end of the couch at some point
to further cushion Dean’s legs and dozes on and off, but these are all movies they’ve seen anyway.

“Are you going to tell me what’s been on your mind?” Cas asks from his lap, as the house grows
dark around them.

Dean makes a face. That isn’t what he expected today. “It’s nothing. It’s fine.”

Cas sits up slowly, straightening against the back of the couch beside him as if he’s trying to find a
position that’s comfortable. That tracks with what Dean remembers of the kind of frustrating,
inescapable pain what’s going on would be causing him. He wishes he could do more to stop it.

A tired sigh. “Dean, when you say something is one of those things it is usually neither.”

“It ‘should’ be nothing.” He hesitates, and Cas is still looking at him with that face that means he’s
not going to let it go for much longer. “It’s just dreams.”

“I noticed.”

Dean lets out a fond chuckle. “It can wait until you’re feeling better.”

Because he knows what will happen. In the last two and a half years they’ve held each other after
nightmares so many times…but this is different. This time his stupid brain is honed in on
something Cas doesn’t know. Something Dean hoped he’d never have to tell him.

Cas will want to comfort him about it, and he shouldn’t have to do that right now. He’s miserable,
and it shows. His face twists up when he tries to move again, and Dean gets up with a gentle pat on
his shoulder.

“I think you can take some more stuff now. Or it’s close enough, anyway. I’ll get it.”
***

The aborted conversation is forgotten through another long, miserable day, and so are the ones
from Friday that didn’t quite happen. Until the next night Dean returns to their bedroom from
putting up the detritus of late-night snacks—whatever he could get Cas to actually eat—to find the
room cold and one of the double doors open onto the screened-in patio at the back of the house.

Theoretically screened-in. Half of the screen panels need to be replaced, but he’ll get to it. It’s still
a cozy place to sit when it’s warm.

It is definitely not warm.

He finds Cas pacing back and forth between the secondhand patio furniture in nothing more
substantial than a sweater, rubbing his arms.

“What are you doing out here? It’s cold as hell.”

“It’s a…welcome distraction, actually,” Cas murmurs between chattering teeth. “From the
discomfort, in any case. I wish it helped more with other things.”

Dean crowds up close to him for warmth and despite what he said, he doesn’t seem to mind. “What
kind of other things?”

Cas is quiet for a long time, pressing his cold nose into the front of Dean’s shirt. “What if
something happened to them?” he murmurs eventually. “What they’re doing—separating
themselves—it’s unprecedented. It could be dangerous. I—“

“Wouldn’t we know?” Dean asks. He frowns out at the night, holding Cas closer under his chin

“Not if it didn’t…necessarily…” He trails off like he doesn’t want to complete that thought. “If
Jack instructed heaven to continue telling everyone that everything was fine if anything…”

“He wouldn’t do that. He hates lying, remember?”

A huff of breath against his collarbone. “Yes, but he’s very clearly demonstrated that he is not
against the occasional omission of truth if he feels he’s protecting people he cares for. And I
understand those instincts.”

Dean slowly releases a gust of air. “Is that what you’re so worried about all the time?”

Cas pulls back enough to look up at him. “Is it that clear? I’ve tried not to…I don’t mean to worry
you.”

Dean takes his face in his hands. “Hey. Whatever it is, it’s not that bad. I’m sure of it. And you
don’t have to worry about me; if you need to talk, talk to me, okay? I can’t promise I won’t suck at
it, but…”

Cas laughs uneasily, letting out another chattering breath in the cold.

Dean rubs his back through his sweater to create some heat from friction and tugs him back toward
the door, really starting to feel the cold seep into his own bones by now. “Come on, come back to
bed…”

He manages to get them back inside, but by the time they’re huddled up in bed there are tears
tracks on Cas’s face.
“No matter what happened, Jack wouldn’t just let us worry, okay?” Dean says.

“I know…”

“I’m sure we’ll hear from him soon.”

The only answer he gets to that is a nod against his shoulder, and Cas is still crying. Quietly, sure,
but he’s crying and he must still be in pain, and Dean can’t do anything to help any of it. And it’s
stupid. It’s stupid that Cas has to go through this at all and it’s stupid that he can’t help. It’s the
stupidest thing to ever be stupid and it occurs to Dean that really he’s just as helpless as he was
before he even came back.

He’s here this time, alive and in the same dimension and he still can’t do anything. Cas can cry on
his shoulder instead of into a wall between them and that’s really it.

***

“You could’ve…s-stayed. We’re just switching places…”

“No the hell we’re not!”

Dean turns his head enough to catch the first skin he comes in contact with against his lips.
Somewhere behind Cas’s ear, he thinks; he doesn’t care. Sweat and grime and the stretch of
tendons beneath the skin. With one arm still keeping Cas steady against him the other shifts higher
to push fingers into soft, damp hair. He can’t be close enough. Maybe if he’s just a little closer
everything will be fine.

“We’re not,” he repeats, muffled against Cas’s neck.

Everything is getting heavier. Cas slumping in his arms, his head growing heavier on his shoulder,
his screams from earlier when Dean could do nothing from the other side of the window echoing
in his head and it’s not right. It’s not fair. He’s here; things should be better now. Cas shouldn’t be
bleeding out in his arms. He should never have been hurt to begin with.

“Cas, come on…”

The fingers twisted in his shirt are slipping and a scream of his own is climbing in Dean’s throat…

This time Dean wakes up when he hits the floor tangled in a blanket, the sound of a shout dying
around him that he realizes was his own. He scrambles up against the side of the bed, trying to get
his breathing under control, trying not to make any more noise than necessary and hoping he didn’t
wake Cas.

But he can already hear the movement from the other side of the bed, from above him. Who was
he kidding?

“Dean…!”

Cas comes around the bed maybe more slowly than he would have if it were any other time, but
there he is soon enough, sliding down onto the floor beside Dean with a chorus of grunts.

He should have been up by now, but he feels frozen until the warmth of Cas’s body presses into his
arm and finally begins to thaw the seize of fear in his chest left over from the dream.

“Dean? Are you all right?”

He opens his mouth, but a whole lot of absolutely nothing comes out.

“You’re not,” Cas says gently. “I know it wouldn’t be something so serious as hidden memories
eating away at your mind like it was for me before you returned, so I’ve tried not to pry too much,
but I know there’s something you’re not telling me.”

Dean sighs and pulls up his knees. It feels fitting that he can hear thunder in the distance in the dim
early morning light.

“Yeah.”

***

“Oh, Dean…”

Cas’s soft response is the only sound for a while, after Dean explains. After he explains what’s
been haunting his latest dreams—what he didn’t tell Cas two and a half years ago. It’s quiet as the
bedroom slowly lightens around them.

Dean winces when Cas’s breathing gets heavier with discomfort, as it starts to cut into the silence.

“I didn’t want to bother you with this before you felt better.” Cas gives him a look and Dean pushes
to his feet and helps him back up and into the bed. “Fine, I didn’t want to bother you with it at all.”

“Why not?”

It’s not accusatory, not angry. It’s just a question, but Dean is still tense. Like he’s expecting a
fight. It doesn’t always happen, certainly not anymore, but sometimes it does. Sometimes his body
still reacts as if things are the way they used to be. Before they were better. Before they grew.

Cas curls into his side and pulls a pillow under his head, looking back at Dean expectantly.

Because they talk to each other now. They can do that. Things are better now, he reminds himself.

Dean stretches out beside him, closing his eyes for a moment to steady himself. To convince the
knots in his shoulders to release.

“Because…it’s stupid that it’s still…I mean, I’ve seen enough…heard enough. Even with you.
God, I—” He stops. “ That’s what’s giving me nightmares so bad I’m fallin’ out of bed? I’m havin’
a heart attack when you climb a damn ladder?”

“You’re allowed to be affected by things, Dean...”

“Hasn’t it been long enough?” he shoots back in frustration.

Cas raises an eyebrow at him. “I may be relatively new to the human condition, but even I know
that isn’t how it works.”

He huffs, pulling a pillow over his eyes. “I know…”

“I wish it was.”

Dean just grumbles quietly. Long fingers fit between his where they rest on the sheets.

“I think…circumstances can change how something affects us,” Cas’s disembodied voice says.
And he doesn’t have to say he still dreams about it too. They both know he does. “It certainly
wasn’t the first time I’d been tortured…wasn’t the first time I’d been in danger like that as a
perfectly mortal human but…it was the first time I had so much to live for.”

Dean winces at that, squeezing the hand in his tightly and pulling the pillow away from his face.
“I’m sorry the being human is kind of majorly sucking right now.”

Saying that is easier than engaging with the rest of what Cas said, even though he’s probably…
definitely right. But at least Cas doesn’t give him any shit about it. He’s probably too tired to,
which. Fair. So they just lay there for a while, until Cas has to get up again to disappear into the
bathroom.

He stares at the ceiling until Cas returns, pillowing his head in Dean’s shoulder.

“You need anything?” Dean asks.

“For this to be over with,” Cas groans. “That would be nice.”

“Yeah…” Dean makes a face. “When I was stuck in heaven…for some reason I thought if I was
here I could protect you…cause you've been through enough, you know? But that was stupid…
you’re the one keepin’ me out of trouble half the time.”

Cas grunts quietly into his neck in amused affirmation.

“It’s not all bad, right?” It comes out with a smile, like he’s teasing, but there’s more vibrating
behind his teeth, stretching his lips tight and strained. Sometimes he’s not even sure himself that
the anxiety is creeping up on him again until after he says something like that. “I mean…I know
we don’t have Jack back yet, and it’s probably not everything you wanted, but it’s—it’s not…?”

Cas pulls back and looks at him wide-eyed, understanding flooding his face so immediately that
there’s a momentary pang of regret in Dean’s chest. Guilt? Something.

But then Cas is smiling at him softly and pulling him close, fingers caressing his face, and he can’t
be sorry to have those eyes turned on him like that.

“No, of course not,” Cas says. “I am a very lucky man…which is saying something seeing as I
began my existence as an angel.”

There’s a pause where both of them are trying not to laugh at that and failing miserably. Even in
the dimness it lights up Cas’s whole face and even after all this time—no time?—it still sends a
thrill through him.

“I am very happy,” Cas tells him. Because it’s what he needs right now, and Cas always knows it
somehow. Whether it’s questions like the one he just asked, or something else Dean says, or does,
or a look about him…

Cas always knows. This isn’t the first time they’ve had a conversation like this, and it won’t be the
last, but that’s okay.

“There are always things that we want…things that aren’t perfect. It wouldn’t be a human life if it
was perfect.” Cas manages to cock his head even though he’s horizontal. “You said you wanted a
human life with me…in all its imperfections.”

“I do,” Dean whispers. “God I do…just not a fan of you being upset, I guess. Or hurt. There was
enough of that before.” He makes a face. “I’ve caused enough of that before.”
Cas leans closer, kisses him. “I could say the same. About any of that.” And there’s a little less
regret in his voice than there might have been in the past. They’re making progress.

“We used to be pretty good at hurting each other…”

“There’s no need to think about it anymore,” Cas says. Not that they won’t ever, but they know
that. “Go back to sleep with me.”

***

Cas seems to feel worse through the morning but better, actually, once the afternoon rolls around.
Better enough to give Emma a call himself because even if, maybe, the thing is gone, he doesn’t
think he’ll be up for company by tomorrow night. And there’s no way to know if it is gone but to
wait.

For dinner, Dean makes a stack of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on a plate that he brings to
the living room, where Cas is ensconced on the couch in a purgatory of still feeling too semi-
queasy to eat anything very heavy, but being hungry enough to want something filling.

He gets a brilliant smile when he hands the plate over, and it makes the iffy day just that little bit
better. The background of some of their favorite Frank Turner music doesn’t hurt either.

“But me I always needed the B sides, and not just the best of. I saw fireworks aplenty when I met
you, but now we've worked to build this into a fire.”

It always seemed fitting that this song was released after they were together. It’s full of things
they’ve been learning themselves.

“Because we’ve both been doing our best, skirting round the edges of perfect. Darling I know this:
It’s the work that makes it worth it.”

Goodness knows they’re not perfect either, but at least they’re doing all of this together.

***

The doorbell rings during their late breakfast the next morning which, thanks to Cas feeling better,
is a little more substantial. They look at each other, equally confused, and Dean is the one to leave
his eggs and bacon to answer the door.

He doesn’t know what he expected, but it certainly wasn’t Jack and Amara. Jack raises his hand in
that still little wave of his and Amara is smiling over his shoulder.

“Special delivery,” she says.

Jack doesn’t even have time to really get out his “hi” before Dean launches himself over the
threshold to pull the kid into a hug, and in that moment he knows he was always just as worried as
Cas was. The whole time. The frigid air outside and the cold, worn porch boards under his bare
feet don’t matter because something in him is relaxing and everything is even better than it was ten
seconds ago.

“Hey,” Dean says. Because he’s not sure what else to say.

But it’s fine, because he has to let go. He can hear the floorboards creaking behind him and he
willingly clears out of the way, scooching over on the porch just enough to let Cas out. To watch
him collide with his son and wrap him up in his arms and nearly take the kid off his feet.
“I’m so sorry,” Jack gasps out. “It wasn’t supposed to take so long but we couldn’t stop once we’d
started and it was so hard , I—”

“It’s okay,” Cas says. “It doesn’t matter anymore; you’re here.”

There are already tears on Cas’s cheeks, but it’s fine. Dean is pretty sure they’re the good kind.
There may or may not be a few hanging out in his own eyes at the moment. Maybe.

“Yeah,” Jack croaks. As tight as Cas is holding onto him he looks like he’d be running out of air if
he wasn’t, you know, god. But there isn’t a word of complaint until Cas finally pulls back enough
to look at him.

“And you can stay now?”

Jack nods quickly. “Yes. I’m staying. Since we have the same power and abilities now, I’m leaving
the rest of the fixing things to Aunt Amara.” He pauses, smiling at her. “You were right, Cas. I
don’t have to do everything.”

“And you shouldn’t have to,” Amara agrees.

Cas smiles back, squeezing Jack’s arms, and maybe one of the celestial beings is doing something
because Dean is pretty sure he should be freezing his ass off right now, but he’s fine.

Cas studies Amara for a moment. She’s just been standing there, just outside of their little huddle
with a satisfied look on her face. “So the two of you are fully separate now? And you are corporeal
again?”

“As much as I ever was, I suppose. When I want to be.” She tilts her head when Cas raises an
eyebrow at her. “For the moment, yes.”

Cas nods. “Good.”

With that, he pulls her into an embrace. She freezes for a moment, not seeming to have expected
that from anyone other than Jack, but after a shocked few seconds she returns it. Maybe it should
surpise Dean, but it doesn’t. Cas has long since filled him in on the details of the almost co-parent-
like relationship they’ve shared over Jack since he and Amara merged. But through all of that,
Amara never had her own body.

Amara looks at him over Cas’s shoulder, bewildered, and he’s seen that face before. He’s felt it on
his own face, no less. The surprise when you realize someone truly cares about you, when you’re
the kind of person not always inclined to believe such things. The relief when you realize,
suddenly, that maybe your family is a little bigger than you thought it was.

Dean tugs front door back open the rest of the way to usher everyone in. “Come on, we’re gonna
let all the heat out of the house. There’s breakfast inside. We have bacon!”

The music they’d put on over the living room speakers while cooking breakfast is still going,
drifting out softly into the winter air.

“I guess that this little life is going to have to do. It’s only a little life, mostly just me and you.
We’re trying out a little life to see where it leads. Maybe a little life is all that we need.”

Jack pushes in first, eyes wide. “Look at that tree!”

Amara follows him in, and on the other side of the living room the green window generator is
 blinking. Heaven must already know Jack is here; they’ll call back in a little while to share the
good knews with the rest of their family. For now, Jack is ricocheting around the room with a new
exclamation for every corner and every new decoration and that’s quite enough going on in his
chest, thanks.

Dean is not surprised when Cas gives him a look that says something like I told you so . He’s
laughing as he wraps an arm around Cas’s shoulders to go inside after the others.

“I made a promise I intend to keep: A promise of a little life, just me and you. It’s only a little life,
but I think it will do. Let’s find love in our little life, and see where it leads. Maybe a little life is all
that we need.”

End Notes

Yes, I have had a kidney stone myself, just a smaller one like Cas did here. In college,
while stuck 800 miles from my parents. They are not even a little bit fun. And they really
did just prescribe me stuff and send me on my way haha. But luckily I had good friends,
one of which took me home for the weekend to make sure I was taken care of and okay.

Frank Turner Songs Referenced:

- Little Life
- I Still Believe
- The Work

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