Death Isn't Death When You're Gay (a deancas post-finale fix-it)

Death Isn't Death When You're Gay

Jack has said his goodbyes. He's leaving the boys, for now, spreading his own wings. He says he needs to work things out on his own for a minute. Sam and Dean watch side by side as he moves to walk away, to leave them for- well, Jack knows how long.

Dean trembles next to Sam, clenching his fists, a shaken up bottle of carbonated sludge about to explode. He's pent up, sad and angry and he needs to say something.

"Jack- Jack, wait."

Jack turns, raising his brows in the signature confused expression that has taken up his features since he'd basically popped out as a grown man. It's warm against all odds, and that only seems to make Dean impossibly furious. How was he the only one that cared?

"Can't you, I don't know, do something about Cas?" He asks, words toppling out like jello from a carton. "I mean, Chuck brought Lucifer back from the empty, right?"

He's on the verge of tears, it's obvious. Unheard sobs shake around at the pit of his throat, turning his tone scratchy and deep. Sam looks at him through furrowed brows, a deep frown planted across his lips.

"Dean-"

"I can't." Jack says simply. "I've tried. I've called out to him, but he- I haven't gotten any luck." Jack exhales a bit, eyes softening in a manner of sympathy. "I'm sorry."

Dean nods.

"Thanks, Jack." Sam says, offering up a little wave as Jack turns for the second time and vanishes in thin air.

"Thanks, Jack." Dean says to the void.

They trudge back to the Impala, loss weighing down on their shoulders as they get closer and closer. This is it, they should be happy. They beat Chuck, everything is back to normal- son becoming God aside.

"Hey, Dean, are you- are you okay? Y'know, with Cas, and everything." Same leans against the Impala, hair falling back as he tilts his chin to glance up at the sun.

Dean frowns.

"No. No, Sam, I'm not okay. It's Cas." Dean grumbles, afraid to say anything more, because if he does he knows he's going to break out into tears. No chick flick moments.

"Yeah, Dean, listen. I know that it's Cas, okay, I get it. But you seem really torn up about it." He pauses, a soft sigh escaping his lips. "Was it, y'know, bad? Did he explode or something?"

"No, Sam, he didn't explode," Dean says, voice cracking under thick emotion. "It wasn't- okay, no. It was bad, but he didn't seem to be suffering through it or anything."

"Well, that's something. At the least, I mean." Sam pauses, rubbing down on a sun-spot stained on the impala's dark frame. "Listen, Dean, I get it. Cas was my friend, too."

"No, Sam, you don't. You don't get it." Dean says, lip quivering as he speaks. He trembles against the Impala, knees threatening to buckle under his weight. "He told me something, before he- before he went. And,
I know, I know it wasn't a good time, and I was scared, but I just wish I said it back." Sam frowns over at him.

"What did he say?"

"He told me that," Dean glares up at the sky, trying to contain his impending emotions as he talks. It's damn near impossible. "he told me that I changed him. He told me that he loved me, Sam, and I-" He takes a breath. "And I never got to tell him that I love him, too. And he's dead, and it's my fault. It's my fault."

Dean shuts his eyes, risking a shaky inhale. This is it, his big secret is out. The blunt foundation that had kept him going for years and years, unbeknownst to anybody else. Dean loves Cas.