Ok kind of weird AU thing. Also super depressing but whatever :) hope you can appreciate it!
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"I'll take the strongest of whatever you got."
Cas had tried to ignore the man as soon as he walked through the door, watching him lumber in was like something out of a horror movie. He was broken, battered, bruised; without a doubt the worst Cas had ever seen. He tried not to gape, quickly returning to the glass he'd shattered when he first laid eyes on the man, but it was hard not to. Especially when he came strolling up to the bar right in front of Cas.
Cas said nothing, dumb as a doornail.
"Actually," the man said, making himself comfortable, "Make it three."
Cas blinked stupidly. Snapping out of the fear holding him, he quickly turned around and started to make the man a...what was it again? He hadn't caught it. Not over the blood rushing through his ears.
When you can see people's insides on their outsides, the last thing you should do is become a bartender.
He wasn't born with it. It happened gradually, rather. He first started noticing it after his mother died. Then when his brothers went to Iraq and never came back. It seemed like the more death he experienced, the more loss he was faced with, the more prevalent it became. The clearer he could see it.
How broken everyone truly was.
On most people, he just saw a few scars. A couple cuts and bruises, maybe a black eye or a skinned knee. That was most people. The people who were lucky enough to grow up sheltered and fed and loved and safe. Some people were worse; deep gashes in their skin, permanent scars along their arms, swollen lips and bloody knuckles. The worst he'd ever seen was a girl in her mid-twenties who looked like she'd been through a meat grinder.
Until now.
There wasn't an inch of the man's skin that wasn't stained red with blood. His face was bruised, his skin torn clear off at parts, the lines on his hands replaced by scar tissue. He dripped blood onto the hardwood floor as he walked in, something Cas had never seen before. People always kept their injuries to themselves, but this man seemed to spread his wherever he went.
"Hello? Dude?"
Again, Cas found himself being dragged back to reality. The sounds of the bar at midnight came back to flood his senses, and he realized he'd just finished pouring the third glass of...whatever.
"Sorry," Cas mumbled, avoiding the monster's gaze. He set the glasses on the counter. "Busy night."
"I can tell," the man sighed, "you've got The Look."
"The look?" Cas asked, eyes skimming up despite the fear that seemed to twist in his gut.
"Yeah, you know. Like you've seen a ghost. Like you've seen fifty ghosts." He chuckled hollowly. "Like you've seen fifty ghosts who want nothing more than to crawl into a bottle."
Cas scoffed, beginning to wipe down the counter. "I guess you could say that.'
The man shrugged. "I used to bartend. The Look's practically engraved into me now."
That's not the only thing engraved into you.
But that was the thing, wasn't it? When you can see people's internal injuries on their outsides, why the hell would you become a bartender? That's the last freaking thing you should do.
Except Cas...found that it was easier to handle than just about anything else.
Working in retail, he could see, without a second glance, every child that was being abused. He could recall every twelve year old plastered smile, wrecked with busted lips and cigarette burns that no one else could see. Waiting tables made it easy to see who was cheating on who, who was abusing who, and who was already planning to puke up tonight's special, with a side of salad, not fries. He'd even tried going back to school, but just the memories of the night-dark eye bags and strategically drawn lined wrists made him shudder.
