Pairing: Dean/Cas

Length: 5.2k

Tags: hurt/comfort, angst, Dean!whump, post s13, love confessions, first time, happy ending

Read on AO3

“Painfully delicate and surprisingly strong, silk resembles love.”

~Elif Shafak

It was like flipping a light switch on and off at midnight. The moments of clarity were so glaring, even when the stark black nothingness swallowed Dean up, the imprinted images left behind were still there; Michael made sure of that.

Faces. Places.

Women and men. God—children… Smiling. Happy. Good people—innocent people… Parks, and carnivals. Saturday markets, outlet stores. It didn’t matter when, or what the cross streets were. It was the same every time; Michael would draw back the curtain, and the dark would lift long enough for Dean to see their faces. To feel it happen. To be reminded that he had no control. The blood stained the grooves of his skin and filled the space under his fingernails like a mile marker of greatest possible fuck-ups. It was hot on his hands in the kind of way that burned holes through his soul. Stuck there. Built with each new kill. Michael never washed them—DEAN NEEDED TO WASH THEM—he only brought up the lights.

So, Dean chanted—resorted to it. Turn it off… turn it off… turn it off… was the anthem in his head, because it was all he had. He needed it—repeated it. Over and over and FUCKING over again, because when there wasn’t nothing, there were the faces.

That’s why when Cas’ showed up in Dean’s face, split lip and bloody hands, it didn’t matter what he was saying, or that Dean’s legs and arms were oddly lead-heavy and acid-trip pliable again. His whole damn body felt like the cells had just been turbined. All he could do was scream. Turn it off! Turn it off! “Turn it off! TURN IT OFF!”

He couldn’t stop, even after Cas was holding him.

——

Then there was water.

Keep reading

^{the leader}

^{print: x}