One night, during a rainy rugaru hunt in Oregon, Dean gets a text from an unfamiliar number.

Where are you, it says. His minds jumps immediately to where it knows it should not. He wants to believe it's Cas, his heart flooding with foolish hope, but he stifles it away. Dean has trusted Cas before, and in recent years, that trust has only led to disappointment.

So he responds with an answer in kind: Who are you?

The reply is a long time coming. When it comes, Dean has to pull the Impala to the roadside to read.

I'm the one who gripped you tight and raised you from perdition, it says.

Dean takes three gulping breaths, hunches in on himself. His fingers flutter over the keys, trying to find the words to respond.

Before he can, the phone buzzes again. Where are you?

He swallows hard and types Oregon. Near Salem. His fingers shake.

After the crypt, Cas went off the radar. Dean has distracted himself with drinking and hunting, as always, but in his nightmares Castiel stands over him with that cold silver blade, those cold silver eyes.

Sam? Cas writes.

Research, Dean sends. Then, What do you need?

Castiel's reply is simple. You.

For that, Dean has to set down his phone. He stares out at the bleak gray asphalt, at the rain beating down on his windshield. He clenches and unclenches his hands. He imagines himself a kite in a torrential sky.

Okay, he writes. Where are you?

Irrelevant. I'll come to you.

Dean squints into the rain and sees what looks like a Biggerson's ahead. But no, too many bad memories. Still, beyond that he thinks he sees something smaller, a local diner. He gives Cas the address before he can talk himself out of it.

This won't be like last time. It won't. He has to have faith.

He pulls into the lot, pushes through the door. Cas is already seated in a booth at the back. He looks up when Dean enters, their eyes locking. Dean feels something warm spread in his chest.

"Hey," Dean says. He slides into the seat opposite Castiel.

"Hey," says Castiel. His hands are folded neatly on the table.

I missed you is on the tip of Dean's tongue, but he swallows it back down. "You look good," he says. It has been three weeks and four days since the crypt.

"I can't stay long," Cas says, ignoring Dean's words. "Naomi is looking for me."

"Naomi. Right. You gonna tell me what that's all about, or will I have to spend a month trying to piece together what happened on my own?" The word come out harsher than he intends.

A small frown appears on Castiel's face. "Dean…"

"No, no, forget I said anything. Tell me what's going on now. What do you need?"

"I missed you," Cas says. "Is that not enough?"

Every fibre of Dean's being screams Yeah, Cas, of course that's enough. His fists clench on his knees. "Last I checked, Cas, you were the one who left."

"And for good reason," he says. "But… it's very lonely."

Dean of all people understands loneliness. "Why, then? Why did you leave?"

"Naomi is dangerous," Cas says. "I don't want you caught in the crossfire of my fight. It's my fight."

Dean stares at him. "That's bullshit."

"Excuse me?" Castiel blinks.

"'It's dangerous'? Seriously, Cas? Do you remember who you're talking to? Sam and I may not be angels, but we can handle ourselves against them. We've sure saved your ass on more than one occasion." He stops, takes a deep breath, reins in his emotions. "Look," he says in a low voice," when is it going to get through your head that we want to help? You've always been there for our big battles. Let us be there for yours."

Castiel stares at him for a long, hard moment. The waitress comes to refill his coffee. Then, quietly, "Dean. It's different."

"How, Cas? How is it any different than when you made a deal with Crowley instead of turning to me for help? I would've worked with you, Cas. I'd be on your side if you'd just let me."

Cas curls his hands around the coffee mug. The gesture is so human, it throws Dean off. Sometimes he forgets how much Cas has changed from that first year. How much he's learned. Dean has taught him to drink coffee and to shrug his shoulders and to laugh when he finds something funny. Dean has taught him to lie, and to leave.

"It's different," Castiel repeats, and Dean opens his mouth to complain but is cut off with a look, "because Naomi knows you're my weakness."

"Your- what?"

"I was supposed to kill you," Cas blurts, all in one exhalation, like he's taking something off his shoulders. "In the crypt. I was supposed to kill you in cold blood."

"But you didn't. He, Cas, buddy, look at me. You didn't, so it's okay, right?" Though his nightmares say otherwise.

"Naomi knew," Cas continues, "about you. She locked me in Heaven and trained me to kill you. She trained me to kill perfect replicas, fake-Deans, but they didn't feel fake, they felt like you. When I felt your heart stop, the blood on my hands was yours. When you begged me, pleaded with me, those scared eyes were the same shade of green. Dean, I killed you."

The weight of Cas's words can't quite make contact. "How many?" Dean chokes out, voice rough. He swallows and tries again. "How many times, Cas?"

"Thousands," Cas says. He avoids Dean's gaze.

"Th-" Dean can't even get the word out. He feels a building hysteria in his chest. He wants to scream, or throw something, or maybe hunt this Naomi down and slide an angel blade between her ribs.

"I couldn't do it, at first. And then I could."

And okay, they definitely need to have a serious conversation about this some other time, because Dean knows all about psychological torture and its lasting effects. But they have more pressing matters.

"Caring isn't a weakness," Dean says. "Sam and I figured that out long ago. We thought it'd be safer to be apart, because we're each other's weak point. But we're stronger together. We're stronger with you." He pauses, rolls his words over his tongue. "I meant what I said in the crypt, Cas."

Cas looks at Dean's hands, stretched unconsciously out on the tabletop. His fingers twitch towards them.

"I can't stay long," he repeats, like a goddamn broken record. It hits Dean then, that he is not the kite. He is the string-bearer, the tether. He reels Cas back in when Cas gets lost in the sky.

"Come home, Cas. Please."

"Naomi will be here soon." Castiel rises, as if to leave, even after everything said.

"Let her come," Dean says. He catches Cas's wrist. This is a risk. Dean is putting himself on the line here. But he can't back away now. "Cas, you have to know- I mean, in the crypt, what I said, that's not all I… You have to know. You do know, right?"

"I'm an angel," Cas says with a small smile. "I can read minds. I think I knew even before you did."

Dean's mouth opens and closes as he measures the meaning of that. "It's still- I mean, nothing's changed."

"I know." His smile is sad, Dean realizes, as if he's mourning what could have been.

"So you, I mean, do you-"

Castiel looks at him with those eyes, blue like the open sky. "Always."

And then he is tugging his hand from Dean's grip and slipping away. Again.

.

A/N: I would highly recommend listening to the songs Youth by Daughter and Yardsale by the Avett Brothers. Title comes from the former.