Event: Angstpril 2025 ; hosted by @chaos-company
Fandom: Supernatural
Ship: Castiel x Dean Winchester | Destiel
Rating: T
Tags: My boyfriend said it ouch in a good way (he said I can quote him on it)
It will forever be one of Dean’s biggest regrets. Not saying anything, taking the time to process what was actually said, and not responding—not reacting in any way. Cas had said the words so softly that Dean wasn’t sure what it was, until the words branded themselves in his brain. Something he’d never be able to wash off or forget.
I love you
That was what left Cas’ lips. He could feel the anguish from the angel more than he could hear it. The words spoken as a last resort. His way of letting Dean into the deepest parts of him yet unexplored by any mortal being. Parts that Dean had subliminally been begging for over the years they’d spent together.
Little echoes of Cas’ voice lingered, when the man himself didn't. Dean tried to convince himself that it wasn’t Cas’ choice. That nobody could have foreseen him being swallowed into Hell as the conclusion to the story, and Dean knew. He couldn’t go back there. He had a one free access pass to Crowley’s domain and he had already used it.
A year before when a demon pulled Cas away from Dean. Again in a situation just like he was faced with right then.
Dean could hear the crack when he fell to his knees in that dusty warehouse. The place that was forever immortalised as where their story began—and ended. No interlude, no body of work. Just Cas saying those wretched words that Dean had waited for. Begged for. Dreamed about.
He stared at the spot where Cas was standing only moments before.
Saw the tears that glimmered as he said the words an angel was banned to speak. But, for Dean, he let go of propriety yet again.
The moment was akin to a heated blade searing its way into Dean’s stomach. On the inside there would barely be a mark to show what he had gone through, but god. The pain.
His throat felt raw and it was only when he felt Sam’s hand on his shoulder that he realised it’d been him screaming. Yelling out for an angel no longer there, a miracle that was never his for the taking.
A prayer that wouldn’t get answered.
“I love you too.” Words that he whispered so soft, with only himself and Sam as witnesses to the weighted statement. One that Cas would never hear.
And what tore Dean apart was that now, with only Crowley and kin for company, Cas would never know how loved he really was. How highly ranked he really was in Dean’s head.
That all the sacrifices and deviance from his path had never been for nought.
That he was who Dean turned to in times of need and elation.
“I LOVE YOU.” The second time he used all of his strength to scream. All the feelings that he’d bottled up under the guise of needing to get the job done, and that they weren’t ready, flowed into his voice. And for only a second, he could pretend that Cas heard it.
That he wasn’t too late, and that Cas would come back.
For a second. He could believe that it would be alright.
Santana is in between again, on the road from Lima to Louisville. Somehow the perfect thermos of coffee Brittany gave her before she left and the perfect fries she picked up a half hour ago have grappled unsettlingly in her guts. Well, she’s awake enough to drive, anyway.
It is exhausting.
And not only that, she is walking around with a stake through her chest invisible to everyone else. Everyone, of course, except Brittany. She knows it is crazy, but she can actually feel when the ends of it brush against something else —or someone else— and it pulls and is unpleasant.
She’s doing it again, the same thing as ever.
And this too is true: in the dream the one leaves, and the other is a dream.
She sees but does not hear Brittany saying: I hear you, but you don’t hear me.
After all this time, the car is redolent of her vanilla. She has to turn to see that Brittany is not there beside her.
So the leaving is the same thing as ever. This time she’s left physically, most times she’s left physically, but other times she just… goes away. And being so far from her dream also makes her just… go away.
Oddly, the only one who’s noticed has been her coach, who has pulled her aside after practice twice now to let her know she knows her heart isn’t in it. And, for safety and for her scholarship, it needs to be. None of the “mentors” —none!— even so much as asked about school, about Brittany, about how things are going, or if she’s happy.
Maybe it’s because she wasn't really there, either. The realest thing to happen over Thanksgiving break was slapping Quinn, and that’s funny —mirthless laugh— because it was like it was staged.
Did you say something, Britty?
And the moments with Britt, ridiculous because of how she controlled how few and how short they were, excruciating because Brittany was warm and beautiful and sweet and shy and funny —dreamy, even— but never approached any closer than Santana initiated. She didn’t seem hurt at all. Just, like, there, but on the other side of a thick plexiglass partition.
It’s not like she needs her or anything. Santana can stand on her own feet. It’s not like they could be together anyway. It’s for the best.
(But it’s desolate.)
Well, maybe. Yes, maybe. But they both need to be doing what they are doing right now, and that makes it pretty much impossible to be together. So again, the leaving.
And in the dream, the one parent leaves, and the other is a dream.
Leaving, she’d tried to make it casual, like friends. Like best friends. But keeping herself from touching Brittany at all, that was next to impossible. That was like taking both ends of the stake and yanking sideways. She’d kept her hands, she’d kept her lips off Brittany studiously and concertedly and religiously for four days. And when it was time to say goodbye, Brittany had leaned in briefly, automatically, and brushed her cheek with her lips, then pulled away, as if she’d remembered that wasn’t what they were doing now. And when they came apart, Santana’s face was wet. She’d turned and left.
All the way back to Louisville, she knows Brittany is saying: I hear you, but you, you cannot hear me.
