#grieving cas

He ends up in the kitchen. He always ends up in the kitchen on nights like this. Sometimes Dean is here. Most of the time even the kitchen is filled with emptiness. He slumps to a seat letting himself feel exhausted. Sometimes Mary sat with him like this, as restless as he was, as scared to belong but wanting it anyway. One time he showed her how to make a hug emoji and she told a story of Dean hugging her when she’d had a fight with John.

He sighs and rubs a hand to his face. When did he start feeling so much…. His eyes land on a colorful package hidden behind flour and sugar packs. His fingers itch to touch it, to drag it out to the daylight. They had gone after Jack’s body to burn him. It hadn’t felt real. Not the pyre, not him as an empty husk, not the fire or smoke. Sam’s sniffs, Dean’s hoovering close to him. Perhaps the same way Cas had tried to be there for him during Mary’s funeral. He didn’t look at him so he wouldn’t know.

This though… a happy bear smiling, a handful of cereal still inside. No one has touched it since. Krunch Cookie Crunch it says. Castiel slips a hand to his pocket, but the decoder ring isn’t there anymore. He’d left it with Jack. A human sentimentality, leaving things to the dead like they could ever use them. It had burned with all that they had.

He outlines the bear, fingers tracing every turn. Jack had been good at gluing them all together. But more than anything, he had just been good. Hugging him the very first time they met face to face. Clinging to him, not hiding his feelings, smiling, proud of himself. Pushing them away to protect them, feeling useless without powers, destroying his soul because he couldn’t lose people he loved. Their son. His son. He had been so very good. Full of love and trust and honesty. Even in the end just wanting to be good.