HOO BOY i’ve missed a few of these, most recent was @writingmyassoff and I tag ya right back. Also @priyaele​, @kaigods, @kowlazovdi, @burningbloodtobringyouback if anyone wants to do it!

The resulting outburst from her sisters is loud enough to startle a flock of starlings out from the nearby trees. Their high, thin cries fill up the morning’s reverent hush, and everyone stops shoving Cas long enough to watch the swarm take shape, for Cas to scatter her seeds in privacy. 

When she‘s done, she looks up to find the birds forming a helicoidal stream overhead, the solemn susurrus of their feathers like waves, like supplication. 

“I really imagined this going different,” Ellen eventually says.

“Differently,” Farah mutters at the same time that Amal says in her flattest, dullest voice, “Do pray tell.”

It’s nearing ten when Luka manages to escape his apartment. 

The pizza was eaten in silence, the others too hungry to speak, and his gluten free impulse had been a correct one: Artie, the one Cas keeps making eyes at, is celiac. Cas insisted on cleaning up, though, and the four of them had swirled around the kitchen as though it was theirs and not his, filling it up and making it warm in ways he didn’t know were possible. When conversation began again, bright and quick and dizzying, Luka had mentioned the beers in the fridge and then used the distraction to slip outside.

He lights up immediately. His fingers shake with the need, and they don’t stop shaking until half the cigarette’s eaten up. Several pairs of eyes watch him from the depths of the garden, but only one shines ember-red. 

Luka steps off the concrete porch into cold-wet grass and moves slowly, letting the quiet of night suffuse him. Somewhere nearby a wood fire burns. He crouches in front of the dog and runs a hand down its back. Its eyes narrow to contented slits.

((continuation of this, during which the twins came up against an ugly truth.))

She takes a swig of beer to tamp down the beginning whispers of panic. On an impulse, she drains the rest in three vicious pulls and hastily stands, muttering something about getting another. She feels the weight of Luka’s gaze right up until she rounds the corner into the kitchen.

The relief of solitude, however artificial, makes her knees weak. She braces herself on the sink counter, stares at the drain, and tries to ignore the twin-shaped void hovering in her periphery even with the wall between them. She turns the water on and watches as it fills the bottle up before overflowing in a cascade of mesmeric ripples. The sight, combined with the white noise of running water, grounds her.

She doesn’t realize she’s lost time until the water cuts off abruptly. With a jolt, she follows the hand on the faucet up to Gideon’s wind-slapped face, which is currently arranged in a picture of polite inquiry. She can feel and smell the autumn night on him. The front door’s still open, and through it, she sees Moth and Artie pulling bags of food out of the car. 

“Family bonding going well?” Gideon asks mildly.

The beginnings of a headache stab along the inside of Cas’ forehead. There are no words for the past week’s confusion, for the way her memory of a spindly pre-teen Luka is constantly contending with the dead-eyed adult splayed on her couch, how they sometimes line up so perfectly their edges blur, and how other times the two versions snap apart so violently she’s left feeling more alone than she could have thought possible.