#s12 truth

They really said dean gives and gives and gives his love but cas can't even understand how to understand that because it's just his normal. In spite of all he thinks and all he's been told being loved endlessly is Cas's normal. Dean loves him so hard every day but he just thinks that's how Dean is because it is because all he does is love

But he hands the mixtape back because he doesn't understand

And dean. Dean thinks oh

he doesn't want it

dean: oh oh shit did he mean it like-- should i say it back no he probably meant like family and not-- yeah yeah but just in case im making him a mixtape but not really a mixtape mixtape just a compilation of my favorites yeah that that'll tell him. he’ll figure it out. yeah, cas is smart he’ll figure it out. 

[3 years later] 

 cas: i want something i know i cant have. i love you 

Well, as I see it, Cas only got to truly understand his feelings for Dean in Heaven Can't Wait. Before then, Cas's angelic nature probably made it easier for him to ignore his more human feelings, partly because feelings are intense and Cas has trouble processing them. Once he's human, I think he has too much going on to quite realize what he feels for and around Dean. That is, until Dean comes to see Cas in 9.06. From then on, I don't think Cas can escape his feelings, not really.

Post-9.06, Cas's does try to repress his feelings, but he simply fails. He's constantly struggling to stop feeling what he feels for Dean because of reasons, which I do think are varied, such as: big feelings are scary, Cas doesn't quite know how to process them, he can't imagine Dean could reciprocate because self-loathing, it's easier to ignore the feelings than look at them being unrequited, pining hurts, etc.

If anything, then, Cas can only truly repress his feelings before his experiences as a human in season 9. He can't escape the reality of those feelings (all of them, really) once he experiences in their full intensity, regardless of his Grace. As such, what we see after 9.06 are attempts at repression that can't possibly work because Cas is always aware of feelings, so denial as a coping strategy would be a more accurate description, imo.

But yeah by s12 Cas is well aware of his feelings and the nature of those feelings, for Dean, specifically. The denial is one born of self-loathing and the fact that it impedes Cas from accurately seeing/reading the love in Dean's eyes (to use Misha's words).

When we get to the confession two things happen:

- Cas fully accepts the inevitability and depth of his love for Dean, and in that moment of vulnerability...

- Cas finally is able to recognize the love Dean feels for him

When you give yourself permission to be happy, when you let the sun shine on your face...that's when I'll come

Before I continue, I just want to say you asked for this, and I cannot be blamed for any wallpaper tearing and wood howling. So ok Jay, Jay ok, let's go.

I have one caveat, though, that it's been a while since I watched season 12, and that as such I'm taking a slight ymmv on when the trutherism deed was done. Sticking with what I think is most likely, and following what I laid out in the manifesto: this is the scenario where after 12.12, but before 12.13, Dean gives Cas the mixtape (ymmv on whatever else might have happened between them). Up until 12.15, Dean and Cas are still talking fairly regularly. Things seem ok, Cas is checking in, giving updates, etc. And then Cas decides to team up with heaven. Cue episodes 17 & 18 when Dean keeps trying to reach him and gets silence and voice mail in return.

And Dean’s trying not to think the worst happened and that Cas isn’t locked up somewhere or dead. So he keeps calling, and telling himself it’s not the same as before, when Cas said yes to Lucifer. It’s not. Or walked into a lake, or was stabbed by a reaper. 

Except. 

Except he was being so good with keeping in touch...until he wasn’t. And the part of Dean that isn’t drowning in worry, the part that isn’t thinking over and over about a hand slipping from his in purgatory or a trench coat floating in water, the part that makes Dean act stupid. That makes a mixtape and makes Cas watch movies, shoulders bumping as Dean balances his laptop between them. The stupid part that thinks he can kiss and hold an angel...Well, that part reminds him of all that Cas hasn’t told him or kept him updated on. 

It had taken so much out of him to do the asking. Dean has never been one not to ask for what it wants if what he wants is someone in his bed. But Cas hasn’t been that in years, if he ever was. If all Dean ever wanted from him was a bit of fun. So Dean never asked. He’s come close over the years; when Cas was human, for the split second he saw a future there. 

He didn’t know how to ask for Cas’s heart, he didn’t even know if Cas had one to give. Not like Dean wanted. Not like what he had already given Cas in all but deed. 

Yet when Cas was dying in that barn, heart on his sleeves and corruption coursing through his veins, that stupid part of Dean overshadows everything else. So Dean does what he doesn’t ever do, he asks. He asks with his hands, eyes, skin, with pressing a tape into Cas’s hands, and kissing him slow and careful. 

So careful because Dean’s still not sure this is what Cas meant with his deathbed confession in that barn. But Cas goes with it, like he always does with everything Dean throws at him. Like coffee, and beer, and cowboy movies, and now this. Humanity in all its mundane glory. 

And Dean can’t help but wonder if the answer he had been waiting for was this silence all along. More of the same. The mission, always the mission. 

Stupid. 

Then he sees Carmen, who’s beautiful and willing in all the ways Cas isn’t. Not that asking her for a fun night helps. Dean knows that, has known for years, has been tired of trying for years. But he keeps doing it, he keeps hiding in people he wants, but doesn’t love. Keeps offering Cas beer, and letting him be the one to pick which show they’ll binge next. Keeps offering Cas things Cas has no idea how to accept.  

unlike grief arc of s13

unlike divorce arc of s15

he sure did, anon!! 😭😭