InsaneJournal

Who: Dean & Castiel Winchester
What: Talking, stages of grief (aka: getting drunk)
When: 9/12
Where: Their house
Rating: pg-13. There’s sadness and drinking over [presumed] death.
Status: Complete




His brother was dead.

Dead, and he hadn't even been the one to avenge him despite all his best efforts. The scene was cleared, people were taken to the hospital (regret: Castiel was not angel enough to heal anyone, and for that, Samandriel's sister was in a coma.), and somewhere along the way he and Dean had gotten into the Impala, and driven home.

That night, with no words at all, they'd scrubbed the blood from the kitchen and living room floors, picked up furniture that had been overturned and then stared at each other. Castiel did not remember going to the bedroom or falling asleep, but it must have happened, since that was where he woke up the next morning.

He called in to work. Family emergency. There seemed to be a lot of those, lately. Castiel realized with a sick certainty that his life would never again be what James Castiel's had been. Most of the day he sat at his kitchen table, chin on his arms and gaze on nothing in particular. He felt awful and sad and more than a little angry. He'd left his words somewhere the day before and hadn't yet found a reason to bring them back.

Dean hadn’t really gone to his pie date with Scud. Not that Scud would really mind all that much because the guy seemed perfectly content to eat pie all on his own. Hell, he might even still talk to Dean even though he wasn’t there.

No, instead he took a bunch of painkillers, the antibotics Cas had stolen for him, and got in the car and spent a good couple hundred dollars on alcohol. He came back and set the bottle heavily on the table in front of Cas.

He had a bottle of whisky in his own hand and was drinking straight from the bottle. “Don’t stop until you stop feeling.”

Cas turned bright blue eyes from the bottle in front of him to Dean and then back again. Inwardly, he knew this was probably wrong. Dean had done so well at a great cost to stop drinking, and it was irresponsible to let him start again.

He didn't know why he didn't say so. He didn't know why he just opened the bottle and did exactly as suggested, mirroring Dean in all ways and not even bothering with a glass.

It burned on the way down, making Cas' eyes water, and he decided that that was one of the feelings he was going to drink away, too.

“I’m glad I didn’t let you do it,” Dean said, wincing. He shouldn’t be drinking at all. He was on medication and still had so many stitches and a wound that wasn’t healing. “I’m still not glad it was done, but I’m glad it wasn’t you.”

Dutifully, Cas took another long pull from his bottle before moving to pull out a chair for Dean to sit in -- a little closer to him than the chairs usually were.

"I'm still angry about it," Castiel said, and his voice cracked slightly -- it'd been a while since he'd bothered speaking. "But…"

“But you don’t need that,” Dean said, still drinking, but not sitting. He didn’t think he’d manage getting back up again if he sat. He sighed heavily. “Once you’ve killed, you don’t go back from that.” And he spoke from experience in this life and the other.

"I don't think it's about what I need." Cas looked down at the table, frowning, and ignored the fact that Dean kept standing. It was just easier not to point it out.

Honestly, as angry as he was about it all, he knew Dean was right -- Castiel wasn't exceptionally keen on violence, and as evil as that being had been, he wasn't sure he would have been able to handle it if he'd killed. He sighed, took another drink. "Dean," he said, tone soft. "I don't know what to do now." Everything was broken, whether he'd pulled the trigger or not.

Dean looked over at Cas sadly. “You look yourself in the eye every morning and you learn how to fake it. You do everything in your power to present as normal and when you get home to me, you let that all fall apart and together, we’ll make it through this. Nothing’s gonna bring that kid back, though. No matter what we do, and the sooner you accept that the sooner it’ll start to get easier.”

The advice was somehow solid and exceptionally painful, both. It was very hard to accept the death of someone who had been as timeless as himself, someone who he'd grown to love over only a few short weeks, and who he had loved for millennia before that. Angels were not meant to die. Castiel nodded anyway, because what else could he do?

Absently, he peeled the label from his bottle, scraping at it with short fingernails. "Are we okay?"

Dean carded his fingers through Castiel’s hair. That his ears and tail were gone now, or really all signs of cat at all, seemed secondary. “We’re always more than okay,” he said. “This doesn’t change anything.”

"I acted in anger," Cas went on, like Dean hadn't spoken at all, and like he was trying to make up for the fact that he'd uttered not a word before now since yesterday. "I am sorry for that." He leaned into the touch anyway, bringing his bottle with him.

“I know,” Dean said, closing his eyes. He took another swig. “But you had every right to be angry.” It just wasn’t Cas’ kill. It would never have been Cas’ kill, because the asshole wasn’t going to kill Dean. But then, Dean had already made the point at the time and Cas hadn’t listened.

Every long swallow made the alcohol burn a little less, and Cas welcomed that immensely. He knew he should probably stop soon, just because he'd never been all that great with tolerating liquor. Really though, he didn't see the point, so he didn't. Everything would probably be much nicer once the world went fuzzy around the edges.

"I'm still angry." He he said that already?

“Allow that for a while then, and it’ll pass. What comes next is worse, though, so...maybe hold onto the anger.” Dean bent to kiss Cas’ head. “I’ve got you,” he whispered, “no matter what, at least one person in this world has got your back and that’s more than most can say.”

Closing his eyes, Cas wondered if he should feel guilty for enjoying that kiss, that touch of comfort. His brother was dead, and Castiel was still in love. That hardly seemed fair. He did not ask what came next, didn't want to know, but could already sort of guess. Probably more guilt.

He licked his lips, took a slower swallow of his booze. "You too," he said after a minute, and tilted a little into his chair in order to thread his fingers into the material of Dean's shirt. "First priority." Pointedly, he did not think of Lucifer, his other brother in some regards, who was alone, who had killed his own lover. Who no longer had a first priority.