“Thank you for looking after my boy”

….

Sometimes Dean wonders what Mary would think of Cas, but he’s pretty sure he knows. 

There might be an ‘I told you so’ in there. 

… God he wishes she was there to say it. 

Sam can’t help but grin as he watches his brother fight with the piece of tin he’s been trying to get in place for the past ten minuets. The roof is so hot he can see mirages wafting off it in waving lines, and Dean’s spitting out curses each time he burns his hands.

“That’s totally crooked, man,” Sam calls as his brother sits back on his haunches. Dean glares down at him, face beet red from a mixture of sun and his growing frustration.

“You think you can do better?!” Dean growls and Sam shrugs, taking a quick swig from the beer sweating in his hand.

He watches his brother’s eyes track the moment, sweat staining his shirt and trickling down his hairline.

“It’s still crooked,” Sam says, pointing with his spare hand and Dean flips him the bird.

Sam loves this. Not Dean burning to a crisp (though it is kinda amusing) but the fact that they’re fixing up a house, their house, that Sam just finished unpacking the very last box of things with no intention of repacking them. He loves that he can hang up his shirts, that he’s learning which steps are creaky, that he’s starting to figure out the trick to the sticky deadbolt on the front door. He loves that Cas has become a fantasy addict of all things; disappearing into the old copy of The Hobbit Sam stole from a high school in Pennsylvania his senior year.

“This is a fascinating exploration of the human condition,” Cas had explained over breakfast that morning, and Dean had choked on a mouthful of bacon as he laughed.

“Its about elves and orcs and talking trees, man!”

But Cas hadn’t heard a word, already lost in the next chapter as he nibbled at Dean’s discarded crusts.

He hadn’t put the book down yet, Sam had watched him follow Dean from room to room as his brother oiled creaking hinges and squared up the doorjamb in the bathroom. Silently mouthing words to himself, he hadn’t even looked up as he passed each requested tool to Dean.

The inside of the house was finally done. Just a few creaks, one to two leaks and a few coats of paint away from being worthy of a spread in some décor magazine, Sam thought proudly. Not that he was biased or anything.

The wind was humid and thick, and Sam was glad Dean was such a stubborn bastard because, really,getting onto that roof in this heat to help him looked like more trouble then it was worth, leaky kitchen be damned.

“Don’t make me come down there!” Dean growled as behind Sam, Cas started muttering something that sounded suspiciously like Elvish. Dean’s eyes flickered up, face turning pained. 

“Oh god, you’ve turned him into a geek!” Dean groaned.

Deans the first to admit that a few things go over his head. Mostly emotional pansy stuff, the occasional boring book reference, but as blind as folks seem to think he is, Dean sees things. 

Or at least the important stuff.

The plate is warm in his hands,  squeaky clean and fresh from the sink, and as soon as he dries it, Cas passes him another. Like Baby’s engine, they are perfectly synced.

Castiel’s fingers are pruning from the hot water, the suds a lemon-scented mess of white foam, dishes and knives hidden under the mountain Dean had watched him make by mistake as Cas had squeezed the detergent bottle too hard, half of it emptying in one violent stream of green liquid over Cas’s hands and the counter. The guy has bad days, four broken plates and a crushed faucet kinda bad, but he’s been getting better at controlling his angel-juiced strength. 

Today Cas is distracted, his movements unnaturally slow, not in a careful ‘I’m trying not to shatter any cups today’ way, but in a ‘watching the pull of tendons on the back of my hand as I move’ kind of way: detached, clinical… worrisome.

The sun is setting, the heat of the day slowly seeping away, but the air’s still kind of muggy in the kitchen. Sweat’s dripping along the small of Dean’s back, the steam and hot water not making it much better. 

Cas hands him another plate, skin waterlogged and plump, the swollen whirls of fingerprints the remnant of someone else’s identity.

He had talked about Jimmy once, just after they had moved in. Lying on a mattress on the floor in their empty bedroom, bodies sore from a day of making the place hospitable, or at least cleaner then one of their old squats, Cas had talked about regrets and broken promises. He talked, too, about how he sometimes found his hands automatically knotting the laces of his shoes, following familiar patterns while he watched in fascination. How his body knew things he’d never learned.

Cas had said he was getting better with his stolen hands, just letting them do what they wanted to after 34 years’ experience in everyday life. Sometimes Dean wishes he could have gotten the chance to get to know Jimmy better, could have gotten the chance to talk to him… to thank him.

Cas pauses, dishes clinking against the bottom of the sink as he slowly raises his hand, watching the the water clinging to the fine hairs on the back of it, oblivious to the suds slipping down his arm, soaking his rolled up shirtsleeve. Dean nudges him with his hip and Cas blinks, three quick little movements as if to clear his head before he turns, a small, almost-smile on his face. Dean offers him a quick grin and between one breath and the next his Cas is back, face reserved but lively when you know where to look, the ghost of Jimmy leaving his eyes.

Cas nudges him back, movement clumsy and endearing, and they return to the mess they’d been putting off all day.

They continue in comfortable silence until a dish smashes, the almighty CLACK of ceramic almost covering the tiny ‘shit’ Cas spits out, and Dean knows the world is still turning as it should.

Sam had joked that Dean was trying to protect Cas from the world with as many layers of steel as he could. Dean had muttered something unintelligible under his breath, ears pink, but Cas couldn’t help but notice that he’d never disagreed.

Overprotective statement or not, Cas was very fond of his 1956 Chevy Apache Fleetside Pickup; if for no other reason than that it was his.

It was a beast of a car, Dean had explained with pride. The type Cas didn’t have to worry about denting if he closed a door too hard. It was robust and stubborn, a remnant from an era where things were built to work hard and last. Cas never had to be delicate or subtle, or worry about leaving dents in the steering wheel or crushing the stick shift under his grip. In the vintage Chevy, Castiel did not have to worry about his abnormal strength.

Cas remembered Dean fighting his way around every turn whilst he ‘showed him the ropes’.  Hand over hand around the wheel, muscles flexing as he coaxed the truck into a wide circle in the empty paddock.

His voice had been light despite his firm grip on the car as he explained rules and tricks. Comfortable in the familiar role of teacher; stories of a young Sam piling up on the dashboard as Dean had filled every pause in Castiel’s lessons with memories of Sam’s, painting vivid pictures in lude language of back roads and bunny hopping wrecks as Sam discovered the clutch.

The Chevy was as perfect as his lessons had been. It was slow to stop, slow to move, but its motor growled and chugged merrily once it was on its way, and Dean’s gift granted him not only the freedom of movement, of independence, but also a respite.

He watches Cas puttering about—all mugs and coffee pots and morning sunlight bright in their little kitchen—and he swears he sees the faint shadow of wings.

But Cas is human (ten fingers, ten toes, belly button lint and all), and when Dean blinks, anything he might have seen is gone.

A warm mug of black coffee is pushed into his hands with a warmer smile and he forgets about half-dreamed feathers and lightning-laced air. He buries his questions and their worrisome answers with a sleep-mussed kiss and a murmur of thanks.

In the back of his mind he thinks of his mother and father, of his brother and Jess, and wonders if he really might be allowed to beat the Winchester curse.

The Hunt prelude //one //  two  // THREE // four//  fin //