Chapter Text
The whole drive Dean can’t stop thinking about what Jo said. Even when he tries desperately not to. He can’t deny how tempting it sounds to stay, but…
He scrubs a hand down his face and focuses on the road again.
Dean eventually pulls them up outside of a small shop in a quieter part of town. Gold lettering on the window says ‘Crowley’s Curios’, and through it Dean can see what looks like if an antique store and a thrift store had a baby.
If he can’t get a TV and VCR from here then there’s no hope left for the world.
The lady that gave him directions to the store left him with a cryptic warning to be careful if Crowley himself is behind the register, because if he decides he doesn’t like you he’ll raise the ticket prices, but if he does like you, he’ll raise them even more.
The guy sounds like a contrary bastard, Dean thinks, but he’s willing to do whatever it takes to get some decent entertainment into the cabin. He wants to show Cas some of his favorite old movies, and goddammit he wants to show him them as they were meant to be enjoyed – in grainy low resolution on a tiny screen.
Dean kills the engine and looks down at Crow-Cas – he looks so peaceful, Dean doesn’t want to wake him. He’s only just healed his injuries, so transforming, flying around, and the mentally-checking-out thing has clearly taken it out of him. Dean pets the feathers on his head gently until Crow-Cas opens his blue-ringed eyes and blinks at him sleepily.
“Good morning, Sunshine,” Dean says.
Crow-Cas opens his beak wide in a yawn, and Dean’s surprised to find that he never knew birds even did that. He adds it to the growing list of bird facts in his mind.
“Listen, I won’t be long, just stay here ‘til I get back.”
Crow-Cas shakes himself all over as if shedding the last traces of sleep, and then hops forward, fully alert again. “Caw.”
“You can’t come with me man, people get weird about animals in stores.” Dean tunes out Crow-Cas’s loud squawking protests and thinks about it for a second. “Actually, yeah, come with me. If the owner is inside that’ll be the quickest way to piss him off.”
Somehow, even without having eyebrows or lips or anyway of conveying it, Dean can feel the frown that Crow-Cas is giving him.
It’s so fucking endearing.
Dean knows his answering grin is stupid and fond, but he’s getting real tired of fighting it. He points to his shoulder. “Just hop on.”
Despite the previous protests, and the frown, Crow-Cas does immediately flap up onto his shoulder, gripping tightly with his talons. There’s just enough pressure to keep him in place, but not so much that it cuts through to Dean’s skin. There’ll probably be a bunch of puncture marks on the shoulders and arms of this shirt though. Maybe he should invest in one of those big leather gloves. It would look ridiculous, and Cas would hate it, he just knows.
His good mood deflates a little when Dean takes a moment to glance to the side, at the crow sitting on his shoulder. The incident earlier and the panic that had seized him at the thought of losing Cas and not even knowing why is still fresh in his mind. “You gonna be okay?” he asks, trying not to let those feelings influence his voice and failing spectacularly – he sounds deeply concerned, even to his own ears.
Crow-Cas nods, and soft cheek feathers ghost across his jawline so briefly that Dean can’t be sure if it’s intentional or just the way he settles into a more comfortable position on his shoulder.
“Alright then, let’s go.”
Luckily there’s nobody around as they get out of the car – a guy with a crow on his shoulder would probably draw some funny looks.
Dean circles to the trunk and opens it up, reaching in for the bag of snacks he bought from the gas station, but he pushes all the snacks to one side as he grabs the bottle of water instead. He unscrews the cap, takes a large gulp himself and then pours a small amount into the cupped palm of his other hand.
“Figured you might be thirsty, but it’s not exactly like you can have a mouthful from the bottle like me,” Dean explains, face suddenly getting hot and wondering if this is too weird. Is this a weird thing to suggest? It seemed like a good idea when he thought of it earlier, but now it just feels awkward as hell. He’s asking the guy to drink from his hand. “You don’t have to-” he starts, about to throw the water away, but Crow-Cas hops down his arm and dips his beak into it.
After a few seconds he lifts his head back up and rapidly shakes the water droplets from his face feathers in a blur of movement. His eyes squint happily and he lets out a small chirp that somehow conveys warmth and gratitude in a bird noise.
Dean clears his throat. “You’re uh- you’re welcome.” He pours the remaining water out of his hand and wipes it dry on his jeans, aiming for totally casual because this is all totally normal stuff to be doing for a friend. “Your beak is still wet,” he points out, wishing he would just stop talking.
Crow-Cas leans down and wipes his beak back and forth across Dean’s shirt. There’s a playful glint in his eyes when he settles back and chirps.
Dean pokes him in his chest feathers.
They eventually enter the store with a loud jingle, and Dean wonders if it’s some kind of Oakton law that every door has to have a bell. “Just let me do the talking,” he whispers, chuckling at his own sense of humor.
Crow-Cas huffs, but even that sounds warm too.
The first thing that stands out is the smell, like dusty and musty old things, and the swirls of dust motes floating around in the air, visible from the light pouring in through the large window. It’s somehow kinda cozy.
Various items are stacked onto shelves, or inside glass display cabinets, and there are items organized into baskets, some hanging from the ceiling, or even hooked onto the walls. Collectibles, antiques, jewelry, toys, books… it’s the sort of place that would keep Sammy amused for hours.
Dean peeks around to see if he can find the register, and spots it at the other end of the store, partially hidden behind some shelves. Crow-Cas shifts nervously on his shoulder as he walks over, and Dean gives him a quick pat on the head. “It’ll be fine,” he says.
Since Cas’s orders were not to interact with any of the humans that he ‘scared away’ from the cabin, Cain and himself were the only humans he will have seen close up until now.
They emerge out from the maze of shelves to reveal a tall young man stood behind the register, writing onto a clipboard. He looks up in surprise as Dean approaches. Definitely not the owner Crowley then – the lady from earlier described him as a dark-haired, short, arrogant Brit. This guy’s got fluffy ginger hair and a worried expression, that increases in intensity the closer Dean gets. His gaze flicks rapidly between Dean’s face and the bird on his shoulder.
A nametag that says ‘Samson’ is clipped onto the guy’s shirt.
“Hey, Samson,” Dean says, leaning against the counter and trying for the perfect mix of charming and persuasive that got him out of many situations in his youth. (It got him into a lot of situations too.) “You’re probably wondering about the crow.”
Samson says nothing, and if anything looks even more nervous than before.
“He’s my, uh, seeing-eye-bird, very important that I keep him with me, so he’s just gonna stay on my shoulder. He’s very well trained, you won’t even know he’s here.”
Crow-Cas’s talons squeeze just a little tighter on Dean’s shoulder at that. “Caw,” he says, making Samson jump.
Dean laughs a little and reaches over gently to pinch his beak together. “Like I said, won’t even know he’s here.”
The pressure from Crow-Cas’s talons on his shoulder increases.
At the long silence that follows Dean eventually claps his hands together. “Great, well, we’ll just” – he gestures to the rest of the store – “leave you to your work.”
Samson gives them both another hesitant inspection, as if he can’t quite decide whether this should be allowed, before he finally returns to his clipboard. “I don’t get paid enough for this,” he sighs, seemingly happy to pretend that they don’t exist.
Dean waves as he escapes into the rows of shelves, and as soon as they’re out of sight feels a familiar flicking sensation as Crow-Cas jabs his beak into the shell of his ear.
“Ow!” Dean hisses. “Yeah, I knew you wouldn’t like that, but what was I supposed to say? That I’m practicing my pirate impression?”
Crow-Cas tilts his head.
“Doesn’t matter. The important thing is, this is probably the only store in town where we’re going to get away with that bullshit, so you should enjoy the whole shopping experience while you can.” Dean smiles as he feels Crow-Cas immediately settle down and get more comfortable on his shoulder. “See? You are well trained.” He gets another peck to the ear, and he huffs out a laugh as he playfully swats at Crow-Cas. “Okay, I deserved that one.”
They spend a long time just walking through the shelves and examining the weird collection of items on sale. Crow-Cas tugs on Dean’s collar every so often if he wants to stop and Dean will hold out his arm so he can hop down and look closer at something.
Dean’s never really been one for browsing like this – he’s the sort of person who goes into a store for something specific, buys it, and leaves. But Cas hasn’t been anywhere like this before. His eyes are wide as he looks around and his wings are flicking in and out with barely concealed excitement. Just like earlier with the car, it’s easy to feel like the joy and wonder is radiating out of him, and for once Dean is just happy to just stroll around and look at whatever Cas wants them to. There’s no hurry, and there’s nobody to please but themselves.
Again, he wonders how the experience would be different if Cas was in his human form, being able to talk about what he’s seen and what he likes. Although with his giant wings he’d probably be knocking things over all the time. Dean almost laughs at the mental image that produces. Not like a man with wings could go into a store anyway – he’d be carted off to a lab somewhere to be experimented on or something. This’ll be the best he ever gets.
They’ve been stopped by a cabinet of jewelry for a while, with Crow-Cas leaning so close to the glass his beak is practically touching it. After long enough Dean goes to walk away, but immediately Crow-Cas tugs on his shirt sleeve to bring him back. Dean rolls his eyes but dutifully steps back to the cabinet, noticing the way that the gemstones catch the light and sparkle as they move. “I get it,” he says, smiling with amusement, “this place must be like heaven to a bird that collects shiny stuff.”
Crow-Cas whips his head up and shakes it, as if he’s offended by the idea.
“That’s what we call denial, man.” Dean peers closer at the jewelry. “Don’t see the appeal myself,” he says, “but I’ve seen you get excited by bottlecaps, so it’s not like your standards are exactly high.”
Crow-Cas immediately throws him an unimpressed squinty glare, but then his expression softens and he shuffles from foot to foot in a move that makes him look like he’s undecided about something. He looks up and stares hard at Dean.
“Uh, what?”
Crow-Cas turns his back on the glittering cabinet full of expensive jewelry to hop up Dean’s sleeve a little, still staring intensely. He opens his beak, closes it again, and flicks his wings in agitation.
“Y’know even if you weren’t having to be quiet right now I wouldn’t understand you, right?”
Crow-Cas lets out a huff, clearly thinking, until he eventually points his beak towards the jewelry, then back to Dean. He opens out his wings and fans them out, obscuring the view of the cabinet behind him and repeats the motions.
Dean shakes his head. “I’m not good at charades, I don’t know what you mea- ow! Pecking me is not helping!”
Cas huffs again and repeats his motions, and this time Dean really thinks about it.
“You… prefer the bottlecaps… over the jewels?” Dean guesses.
Crow-Cas nods enthusiastically, his feathers fluffing up, while Dean doesn’t know what to do with the warmth that spreads rapidly through him. At his silence Crow-Cas ducks to smooth down his fluffy feathers with his beak, like he’s embarrassed about it being said out loud, even if he’s not the one that said it.
Dean rubs a hand over the back of his neck. “You’re a sap as a bird, y’know that?”
“Caw,” Crow-Cas says quietly.
They move on and finally get to the electronics.
“That Crowley guy must be a piece of work, these prices are insane.”
Crow-Cas peers at the TV sets with curiosity and Dean is reminded that the price doesn’t matter – he’s got to show Cas what he’s been missing. The guy’s never even watched a movie before. “What the hell do you guys do for fun out there without this sort of stuff,” Dean says, to himself more than Cas, since he can’t reply anyway.
The rows of video tapes provide more choice than Dean had been expecting, and he launches into an excited ramble about his favorite titles, which then spirals into a rant about the ‘state of Hollywood these days’. Crow-Cas listens with a squint of his eyes like he’s trying to decipher another language, but his tail is bobbing up and down with interest.
They return to Samson, and Dean thanks him as he rings up their new TV and VCR combo, complete with a bunch of video tapes. He won’t ever know that he did a good deed by letting a strange guy walk around the store with a crow on his shoulder, but Dean hopes karma finds a way to reward him somehow.
The bell rings again on their way out.
Dean watches his step as he carries their stuff to the car, Crow-Cas flying ahead of him to perch on Baby’s roof. “You’re gonna love Harrison Ford, he’s got everything, the looks, the charm, the skills. He’s a real action hero. Indiana Jones is one of his best roles, you’ll see. We could even marathon all three back-to-back – trust me, there’s only three movies, alright? It just sucks that they didn’t have Star Wars. Me and my friend Charlie used to watch them all the time. Well, one in particular, mostly. For the Han Solo scenes,” he rambles. He feels weirdly liberated for being able to almost admit that he had an embarrassingly huge crush on Harrison Ford, but then remembers that none of this is going to make any sense to Cas anyway, so it doesn’t matter. “Uh, anyway, shit, sorry, none of this is gonna make any sense to you. There’re some solid movies here. We’re gonna have a good time.”
Finally, their purchases are all loaded into the car and Crow-Cas is back in the passenger seat, eager for them to continue their adventure. Before he starts the engine Dean makes a show of patting down his pockets. “Wait, I must have left my wallet in there, I’ll be right back.”
The bell jingles cheerily again as Dean reenters Crowley’s Curios, and he strides back through the shelves without pausing in his step. This time he’s here on a mission.
The small glass swan is exactly where he remembers. He’d spotted it while they’d been browsing earlier, and Cas hadn’t seemed to notice it. Dean picks it up carefully. The glass is tinted white, with a drop of yellow paint on the beak, and its neck is extended into a graceful curve that ends with its head resting on its chest. The detailed glass wings are slightly opened, making it almost look alive – like it’s about to fly away – as it sits delicately in the palm of Dean’s hand.
One down.
He needs to be quick or Cas’ll start getting suspicious.
Dean heads back through the rows of shelving, holding onto the swan carefully, and tries to remember where he saw the next item on his list. Left here… near the typewriters… poking out of a box… Dean spots it. There’s a box of old postcards sitting on a wooden desk, and right at the front is one that has a painting of a pigeon on it. ‘Rock Dove – Columba Livia’ is written below the pigeon. It’s sitting on a branch, with a castle in the background, and Dean supposes the castle is wherever the postcard came from. He flips it over to find it blank.
Doesn’t matter, he just wants it for the picture anyway.
The last stop is the jewelry cabinet they were at before. Cas had been so focused on the shiny jewels that he probably didn’t notice the small collection of animals carved out of gemstones on a shelf right next to them. The various animals are all sitting on paper labels that explain what gemstones they’re made from. Dean reaches for the bird that the label says is carved out of ‘black onyx’. With its slightly curved beak, the talons gripping onto a carved rock, and the way it’s sitting with its wings tucked in tight, it looks just like a miniature Cas.
Dean hurries back to Samson, who looks at his reappearance and empty shoulder quizzically, as he rings up the three extra purchases Dean is making. He pays with the wallet that he pulls from where it had been all along, in his back pocket.
When Dean returns to Baby he goes straight to the trunk and carefully places his small collection somewhere they won’t get damaged, then huffs out a long breath as he finally slides into the driver’s seat. “Can you believe it? It was in the trunk the whole time. Must have fallen in.”
Crow-Cas nods his head, seemingly completely oblivious to Dean’s successful side-quest. (Dean bites the inside of his cheek to stop from grinning with triumph.)
Baby’s engine roars to life as she starts up. “Okay, mission one was a success,” Dean says as he pulls away from the curb, “but we’ve still got to get you some new clothes, hit the grocery store, and stop off for diner pie.”
The more deserted part of town fades away as they cruise through Oakton, back the way they came. The closer they get to the center of town the more people are bustling through the streets again, and the stores and cafes all have bright inviting wooden signs outside.
The idea of clothes shopping seemed easy when Dean had said it, but now he’s cruising past a bunch of stores that all offer clothing, and he doesn’t know which one to stop at. That one seems too expensive… that one too young… only women’s clothes… only baby clothes… even more expensive than the first…
Dean eventually pulls up outside the most normal looking store he’s seen so far. It takes a while to convince Crow-Cas that he has to stay in the car – there’s no way he’s getting away with bringing a crow inside this time – though he does very briefly consider sneaking him in before deciding against it. The jury’s out on whether Cas can act like a real crow (Dean isn’t a good measure of that, he doesn’t know what real crows act like) and someone’s gonna notice when Dean starts talking to the inside of his jacket and it squawks back at him. Getting kicked out of the only normal looking clothes store he’s found in Oakton is not his idea of a good time.
He realizes that this might have been a mistake when he walks inside (after another bell cheerfully announces his entrance) and he’s faced with the task of trying to pick out clothes for someone he’s only seen naked (don’t think about it, not the time) or dressed in a borrowed suit. The only thing Cas has worn that’s been his own so far is his trench coat, and that doesn’t exactly inspire a good avenue of clothing to explore.
How is he supposed to pick out clothes for someone without seeing anything else they wear?
He’ll just have to think of what he thinks might look good on Cas.
And isn’t that its own can of worms.
Dean sighs and walks further inside. The store itself is bright and cheerful, decorated in light wood panels and green carpet. It reminds him a little of the forest back at the cabin.
He lets his hand trail idly across a stand of sweatshirts and hoodies as he thinks, trying to picture Cas in any of them. The big problem is going to be the wings – whatever he buys will have to be modified to accommodate Cas’s wings (by using his trusty pair of scissors again). It seems like it would be difficult to pull something over his head and then tug his wings through the holes at the back, it must be easier to put the wings through the holes one at a time into something that opens at the front.
Okay, he’s got somewhere to start.
Dean picks up a burgundy-colored hoodie with a zip down the front, and tries to picture Cas wearing it. Unfortunately, all his brain can conjure up is Cas in the white shirt Dean gave him.
Real helpful.
Oh, shirts, that’s a good idea.
Dean clutches the hoodie close while he goes in search of shirts, and then picks up a bunch in different shades of blue. It’s a versatile color. Nothing at all to do with how it would pick out the blue in Cas’s eyes.
It seems kinda pointless to try them on when they’re for someone else, but Cas is a little broader in the shoulders and back (because of the wings) so if Dean tries a size up from what he’d normally get, and they’re a bit loose, then he knows they should fit Cas perfectly.
Dean ducks into the fitting rooms and tries on each shirt like it has to pass some kind of quality control check. As expected they’re a little loose on him, but that’s what he wanted. The blue doesn’t look bad on him either, he thinks, opening the top button and examining himself in the long mirror. But he’s not a plain-color-shirt kind of guy. If he’s wearing a shirt it’ll be one of his plaids, over the top of a t-shirt. He might have worn some plain stuff for Amara while they were together, but someone would have to wrestle his plaid shirts from his cold dead fingers before he gave them up again.
There’s a small pile of shirts, a couple of pairs of jeans, a pair of sweatpants, underwear, and socks in Dean’s hands when he heads over to the pajamas. He has the sudden thought that his dad would be throwing a fit if he’d seen him deliberating over how a piece of clothing would suit someone, and then trying it all on for them like he’s in a 90’s makeover montage. Especially for another man. Dean grins in a small private way to himself as he picks up a pair of plaid button-up pajamas. Well, if only his dad could see him now.
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The supermarket is exactly the same as before, and yet Dean himself feels like a completely different person. His whole world view has changed. Ghosts still aren’t real (he knew it), but it turns out there’s a lot else that is. So much has happened to him in such a short space of time, and he feels like he’s even banished some of his own personal demons. He’s reconnecting with friends and family. He’s… met someone.
The pain that seemed to be settled in his chest like a permanent crater feels like it’s finally healing.
Dean takes a deep breath in and lets it out as he enters the store with another cheerful ring of a bell.
Cas didn’t appreciate being benched again, but it’ll be worth it when Dean shows him his haul back at the cabin later.
He grabs all sorts of ingredients that he can cook to feed himself and Cas over the next week, and realizes it’s probably too much, but fuck it Dean’s going to cook up a storm and they’re going to enjoy some good home-cooked meals.
He walks by the bread and immediately thinks of the bakery that he’s had to drive past multiple times already. His stomach makes a loud declaration of agreement at Dean’s idle thought to go there next instead of the diner, so he summons some inner strength to keep walking. He can do delayed gratification.
On his way around the aisles Dean also picks up a bundle of towels to replace the ones that he’s somehow managed to ruin, though these ones are gray instead of brown. At least they’re clean. He throws in a razor and some shaving cream for Cas, and considers getting him his own shampoo and body wash, but is that really necessary when Dean has nearly full bottles already in the bathroom? It won’t bother him to share.
He grabs a toothbrush for Cas though, so he has his own. That’s where he draws the line.
Dean stops walking. The sounds of the supermarket have faded away and been replaced by a thin white noise as he stares at a shelf of condoms. He’s been buying condoms for years – when he was much younger he used to flourish the box onto the counter proudly – and now suddenly he feels weird for just looking at them. He doesn’t even know why he stopped in the first place. He’s walked past them hundreds of times. It’s not like he needs any right now.
Does he?
Shit, stop that.
That box in his mind that he pushed all his feelings into earlier feels like it’s rattling right now.
They’ve only known each other like five minutes.
Cas probably doesn’t even think of him that way – Dean’s a human, that’s gotta be weird for him somehow. The no-wings-thing would probably be such a turn-off.
Why is he even thinking about this?
Just keep walking.
He doesn’t need condoms.
He doesn’t need lube.
(He throws both into the cart.)
(They’re useful to have. He’ll take them home with him.)
Movie snacks are next on Dean’s mental list, so he grabs a bunch of different bags of chips and pretzels, and some packs of popcorn that you heat up yourself. They’ll go great on the grill. A couple more boxes of sugary cereal, pop tarts, cookies… once again the vegetables have been buried by the junk. That’s the way shopping should be. Get the healthy stuff first and then cover it with the fun stuff.
Dean picks up a jar of chocolate powder and turns it over in his hands. If he teaches Cas the Dean Winchester secret to making hot chocolate then he can make it for himself, even when Dean has gone. The thought twinges a sharp ache in his chest. Even a second jar won’t last forever, and it’s not like Cas can come back to buy another when that runs out… Dean picks up three jars and places them all in the cart.
Nearly finished…
Dean walks slowly into the pet section, feeling weirdly guilty about it. There’s only a small selection of items that they stock for people with pet birds, but he checks it all out anyway.
Most of it is useless to him – perches, toys, tiny mirrors… but he spots a packet of seeds and grain packed into bars that are labelled as ‘Bird Treat Sticks’ and he adds them to his cart. He drops in a bottle called ‘Feather Shine’ before he can talk himself out of it, and then throws in one of the tiny mirrors for fun. He’s about to turn away when a book called ‘Beginners Guide To Owning A Bird’ catches his eye, and he takes that too.
His cart is nearly overflowing by the time he takes it to the registers. His finances are something he’ll deal with when he returns to the real world.
It’s a nice surprise to see Cesar again – he has the same warm and friendly air about him as last time. Dean can hear him chatting to the other customers before him in the queue, though his smile doesn’t quite reach his eyes the same way it did when he spoke to Dean about his husband.
His whole face brightens when he looks across from the previous customer and sees Dean. “Hey, Cabin-Guy!”
Dean chuckles and holds out a hand to shake over the register “Dean.”
Cesar grins, shakes his hand, and starts to beep through his items. “Man, how’ve you been? I told Jesse about you, and we couldn’t stop thinkin’ about you alone in that haunted cabin. He nearly made me drive out a few times just to see how you were, make sure the ghosts didn’t get you.”
Dean is speechless for a moment. The kindness he’s experienced from the people in this town is something special. Complete strangers care more about him than his own father did.
“Oh, thanks man,” Dean starts. He’s about to deny that the cabin is haunted at all, even if he can’t explain why, when he pauses. Wait. Fuck. He can’t let the rumor about the ghosts fade away, because people won’t be scared to stay in the cabin and explore the woods, and they might discover the flock of werebirds living right next door. He’s got to keep up the lie.
“Well, it’s pretty spooky up there,” Dean says, laying it on thick, “I mean, I didn’t even used to believe in ghosts, but… some of the stuff that’s been happening, the noises I’ve been hearing. There’s no other explanation.” He wonders for a second if he’s gone too far and it’s clear that he’s lying, but Cesar nods his head with a grim pinch of his lips.
“Cain shouldn’t even rent that place out. Shoulda knocked it down-”
“No!” Dean bursts out, then clears his throat. “Uh- I mean, it’s… such a nice cabin. Uh, despite the ghosts. It would be criminal to knock it down.” Dean packs his things in an awkward silence for a moment, while Cesar gives him a strange look. He sighs and leans closer. “Look, there’s a… guy… who lives in the woods nearby. It’s not haunted, but you gotta say it is if anyone ever asks. It’s difficult to explain, but he doesn’t deserve to lose his home just because nobody is scared to go into the forest anymore. He just wants to live in peace. He’s a… good man, I promise.”
Cesar suddenly looks down at the items he’s scanning – a toothbrush, a razor, towels, condoms and fucking lube.
“Ah,” Cesar says, and Dean feels like he wants to gnaw his own skin off.
It’s not like that, he wants to say, but the words don’t leave his mouth. “He’s a good man,” is what comes out again instead.
Cesar’s expression softens. “Someone to watch horror movies with?”
“I think so,” Dean says, surprising himself.
They talk about lighter topics while Cesar rings through the rest of the items on the conveyer belt, and Dean himself even feels lighter by the time everything has gone through and been packed into bags in the cart. He pays and Cesar hands him his receipt.
A knowing glint enters Cesar’s eyes. “You seem different from before.”
“Yeah?”
“Happier.”
“Guess I am,” Dean says with a smile.
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Crow-Cas is napping on the tower of pillows when Dean makes it back to the car, not waking up until he’s packed everything away and turned the engine back on with a roar.
“Sorry, buddy, took a bit longer than I thought in there.”
Crow-Cas blinks rapidly and flaps his wings a little like he’s stretching them out, then catches sight of all the bags in the back, his tail flicking in surprise.
“Maybe got a little carried away too.”
The trunk got full, so there are bags wedged into the footwells and spread all over the backseats. Dean is trying not to think about how much today has cost him in total. Worries for the real world, he reminds himself.
Most of it is just to stock the cabin up with food for Cas, since it’s not like he can go back to the flock or go back into the woods to… hunt? Forage? Whatever werebirds do for food.
But if he stays in the cabin alone, won’t he end up dying anyway?
What if Michael decides he’s done waiting for Cas to slip up and enter the forest himself, and just ambushes him as soon as he goes outside for a fly one day?
Dean taps his fingers in an agitated beat on the steering wheel.
Maybe he should call Cain and explain what’s happened… He knows about Cas, he could move back into the cabin, or if that’s too painful, maybe Cas could live wherever he’s gone too. They were practically family. He’s got to help somehow, right?
Dean heads back into town instead of towards Benny’s Diner.
“I know I promised diner pie, and we’re gonna get some, but I’ve gotta hit that bakery first – my stomach is rumbling louder than Baby’s engine.”
Crow-Cas loudly squawks his agreement.
They pull up nearby and Dean turns to look at Crow-Cas, his beak almost pressed to the window again. “Look, I definitely can’t take you inside a bakery,” Dean says, with a touch of regret, “health and safety bullshit, but if you hang onto my shoulder we can look through the window. You can pick something to eat and I’ll go buy it.”
Crow-Cas chirps happily, flaps straight onto his left shoulder again (this shirt is going to have more than a few puncture holes in it), and they exit the car.
As expected, they get some funny looks as they walk towards the bakery, but people in Oakton are either too friendly to say anything, or they just want to mind their own business, because nobody makes a comment.
The building itself is pretty small, sandwiched between a store selling kitchen supplies and a pharmacy. It would be easy to overlook, if it wasn’t for the door propped wide open so that the smells of freshly baked bread and pastries drift out of it enticingly. It’s clearly a calculated move to bring in customers – that one-hundred-percent works. It worked on them anyway. Golden light spills out through the window, further encouraging people to stop and peek inside, and as they approach Dean notes that ‘Loki’s Loaves’ is painted onto the glass in fancy gold lettering.
Inside the bakery itself is a single display cabinet filled with sweet treats, while various kinds of bread and pastries sit on a couple of wooden shelves behind it. It looks like there’s nobody manning the counter as they approach, so Dean feels less weird about staring in at all the cakes through the window with a bird on his shoulder.
“Alright, lets see what they have,” Dean says, eyes roaming over the cakes and cookies in the cabinet.
There was a bakery he’d sometimes go to, back when he lived with Amara, that sold all sorts of fancy kinds of bread and perfectly sculpted desserts. He always felt underdressed whenever he went in, and twitchy like he didn’t belong (he felt like that in most places he went to with Amara, looking back) but she made him go whenever she wanted something from there. It had always felt wrong somehow to be surrounded by baked goods that cost that much money, when he’d grown up eating stale bread with his brother in motel rooms, dipping it in soup to soften it up.
Something about a specific shelf of decorated cookies catches Dean’s attention, and he leans forwards with a frown.
“Hey, wait… Are you… seeing what I’m seeing?” He jabs a finger against the window with a thump. “Those cookies… they’re all…”
Birds.
It couldn’t be…
There’s a row of cookies decorated to look like a pink flamingo, a grey owl, a vulture, a penguin, and a bunch of different small birds. At the end of the line are three cookies larger and more detailed than the others – a rooster with a bright red crest and green plumed tail, a golden eagle with piercing eyes and huge wings, and an elegantly posed white swan.
“Holy shit,” Dean hisses, “there’s no way…”
It’s too much of a coincidence. He’s seen all those birds as paintings in the cabin, or in Cain’s photos.
Crow-Cas hops down Dean’s sleeve for a better look, with his head tilted at an extreme angle. His tail is twitching rapidly and it’s clear that he’s thinking the same thing.
That’s when Dean realizes that there’s no crow cookie.
Movement in the bakery pulls Dean’s attention away from the cookies, as a man emerges from a side door and slides behind the counter. He’s wearing a white shirt and a bright green apron, and seems quite a bit shorter than Dean, with sandy brown hair swept back from his face. As if he senses being watched, he looks straight over at them through the window, and his eyebrows shoot up at the same time that Crow-Cas lets out a startled squawk.
Do they know each other?
Before Dean can ask what the hell is going on (even though it’s not like Cas can reply) the bakery guy shoots back around the counter and almost trips over in his haste to get through the open doorway. He comes to a stop in front of them and gestures his arms wide.
“Castiel!”
So, they do know each other.
But he can’t be another werebird… he doesn’t have any wings.
“Well, well, well,” the bakery guy drawls, a mischievous grin lighting up his whole face, “I don’t know what I’m more surprised about, seeing you in Oakton, or that you’ve found a mate!”