"Castiel," Meg started, before hesitating. She dropped her gaze, not quite able to meet his eyes. He was too open in his gratitude. Too soft. Too confusing. She was reminded, forcibly, of the way he'd looked at her in the hospital, and how confusing it had been then. Now, knowing what she knew about herself, she could hardly bare it. That instinct to run, always so close to the surface when he was close at hand, fluttered dangerously. She lifted her hand from his chest, rubbing her fingers together absently, and her other hand slid from his head, coming to rest on the pillow beside him.
"This won't be your last cold, you know," she said, attempting for her usual glibness, but still unable to meet his gaze. "You're human. Mortal. This kind of thing happens to them a lot." She let her eyes flick to his for a brief moment. Something in her chest squeezed tight. She didn't know how to put what she was trying to say into words. He needed someone who understood what it meant to be human, and that definitely wasn't her. Not anymore. Her humanity was long dead. "You might want to think about finding a caretaker that actually knows how to, you know, take care of you." She sounded almost sarcastic, because that was how she protected herself. Sarcasm, anger, and sex. Her three strongest shields. And yet, every time he looked at her, he managed to get past them all.
She looked at him then, her expression carefully controlled. It wasn't his weakness that worried her, it was how much he obviously relied on her, and that was her own fault. She set him up to lean on her. How could she run from him now, knowing he'd fall without her there? But she wanted him to see that he shouldn't rely on her. This wasn't in her nature. What would he do when the day came that her past came calling, or she simply couldn't take the dutiful housewife schtick any more? What if he got sick again and she wasn't there to take care of him? What would he do then?