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thegirlwithmanynames · 2 years

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fatherhood

It’s been a long time since Claire Novak had parents. That’s just the way the world works; some kids grow up in a loving family, spoiled by mommy and daddy until their teeth rot out of their skulls, and some kids’ moms and dads get creatively murdered by feathery jackasses of the Lord. Nothing to see here - life goes on, and the world keeps slowly turning.

Except for when Claire gets an unexpected visit from a stranger, and everything falls apart.

a study of Castiel and Claire, largely inspired by 15x15 Gimme Shelter.

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She’s a cobra, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. Just one more second and she’ll have it right where she wants it, prey perfectly lined up for the kill. Just one more second, and she’ll be home free.

A melody rings out in the darkness, and a bright white light illuminates her position.

“Fuck,” Claire Novak curses under her breath – as if trying to be quiet will help her now that her goddamn phone’s given her away. The vamp she’s been watching snarls as it turns towards her, and her ringtone won’t stop fucking ringing, and her phone’s buttons are slipperier than they’ve ever been, her fingers fumbling to decline the call as she scrambles to her feet.

“Hello? Claire, honey, is that you?”

Fuck. As if her luck could get any worse.

“Mommy’s worried about you, huh, sweetheart? Better say your goodbyes now before I drink you dry,” the vamp sneers, showing its teeth. It’s gaining ground, nearly blocking the abandoned warehouse’s rickety doors.

What a goddamn disaster.

“Do you need backup?” comes Jody’s urgent question over the line, all business now. Never mind that Claire’s a state away and can handle this on her own, thank you very much, and would have been out by now if Jody hadn’t called in the first place.

“Don’t have time to talk right now, Jody,” she replies, eyes trained on the vamp that’s now listening in with a dangerous and amused smirk on its face. It lopes toward her slowly, confident, predator chasing prey. Claire’s machete weighs heavy on her back.

“Ooh, on first name terms, are we?” it taunts. “Maybe Mommy won’t miss you so much after all.”

The words still sting, even if in not the way the vamp intends. It’s been so long since she’s deliberately thought of her mother, how Amelia left, how they found each other, how she –

Well. Not important now.

“Not like anyone’s going to miss you either, bloodsucker,” she counters, and takes a step closer.

“Wanna bet?” The vamp grins, all monster, baring its teeth at Claire’s forward movement and taking its own step toward her in response.

“Claire,” Jody’s voice warns.

The exit’s blocked now. No way out but through.

Claire knows what she needs to do.

“Try me,” she says, and the vamp’s eyes glint in the faint moonlight coming through the warehouse windows.

“Who are you, little girl?” it lilts, amused. It takes one step forward, and Claire tenses. “You’re nothing, nobody. Mommy and Daddy aren’t here to save you. It’s just you and me.”

Her heartbeat pounds in her ears, sickeningly loud. There might as well be lead in her arms. Her face is on fire.

Taunting, the vamp takes another step, baring its teeth once more. “And all I see is dinner. So tell me, bitch. Who the fuck are you?”

Quicker than she’d have thought possible, the fire spreads through her body, burning through the lead in her muscles, setting her heart aflame. Fuck strategy. Fuck everything except sending this bloodsucker to hell, where it belongs.

It happens in a flash. The machete makes a satisfying sound as it hits bone on its way through neck, and the vamp’s head rolls away from its body with its horrifying smirk still on its lips. She’ll have to wash the blood from her hair later, she notes absently. Her muscles are still taut, rage still beating a steady pulse through her body.

“I’m Claire Novak,” she spits. Her machete shakes in her hand. “I’m the one who kills you.”

***

The blood rushing through her ears takes another few moments to subside, and when it does, Claire realizes dimly that the faint tinny noises splitting the air aren’t actually faint at all.

“Claire! Claire, are you okay?! Claire, answer me!”

Jody’s voice sounds frantic. It grounds her, slowing her heartbeat to a more acceptable rhythm. A worried Jody is a completely different kind of beast to conquer. Claire isn’t sure she’d be able to handle that right now.

And besides. Jody shouldn’t have to worry about her.

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” Claire mumbles, switching the machete to her left hand so she can push the right through her blood-matted hair. Still holding up pretty well, she thinks – her own curler never stands up this well to a hunt. She’d plan to thank Alex when she gets back, except Alex didn’t exactly know that Claire had stolen her curler to do her hair that morning, so that option’s out. Maybe she’ll log into Alex’s account and leave the company a review.

Great product!!! Love the way I can go through my whole day and my curls never deflate. My hair holds up great after salt-and-burns, butchering vamps, shooting werewolves, and even killing the nastiest ghouls. Five stars!!

She snorts lightly, shaking her head at the idea. Thankfully, Jody doesn’t pick up on it.

“You’d better be fine,” Jody says through the line, firm now, the anxiety gone from her voice. Claire knows better, though. Jody’s had to get good at hiding it, but Claire worries her. She hates it and loves it and hates that she loves it at all. Guilt caves her chest in just a little bit. “Did you forget our agreement? Or did you decide that we’re beyond writing a quick text letting each other know where we’ll be before heading off on a hunt?”

“Well, it’s not like you ever text me to let me know,” she snaps, but even with the annoyance in her voice, the bite isn’t there. It’s habit now, like double-checking her weapons before heading out. She knows that Jody knows she doesn’t mean it.

I’m okay, she thinks in Jody’s direction. I’m safe.

“I may not text you, but I sure as hell do text Donna – ”

“So I’ll text Kaia, then,” she says. Her voice wavers upwards just slightly, just enough to give away her grin. “Or Alex. Ooh, or maybe Patience. Sound good?”

“All right, smartass,” Jody replies, and Claire can hear the smile break through her voice too. Score. “This conversation’s not over, okay? We’ll get to it when you get back. Where are you now?”

“Lincoln,” she says, pulling her phone from her ear and bringing up Google Maps, “but it’s late, and Google says it’ll be three and a half hours, so I’ll probably stay in a motel tonight and head back in the morning.”

“Sounds like a plan. You’ll keep me posted on the way back?”

“Yeah, yeah.” She waves her machete dismissively, even though Jody can’t see it. Pressing her head hard to her phone to keep it shoved between her shoulder and ear, she finally sheathes the weapon against her hip. With a sneer back at the vamp’s disembodied head, she turns on her heel to face her original hiding place. “Any reason you called in the first place, Jody? Or did you just want to turn my hunt up to hard mode?”

As soon as the words leave her mouth, she winces. Maybe not the nicest way to phrase it. Jody’s been good to her. Claire’s not as young as she used to be. Time to grow up.

“’Cause it didn’t work – still easy as pie. Nothing to worry about.”

Nice save, Novak.

“Har har,” Jody answers sarcastically, but her voice doesn’t sting with hurt, so Claire figures she’s in the clear. Slinging her bag over her back, she heads out toward the creaking warehouse doors. “Nothing big, just, uh. We’ll be having a visitor! Tomorrow, actually! He’ll probably be here before you get back, depending on when you’ll get in.”

“Uh-huh,” she says absent-mindedly, pushing through the doors with some effort. God, she’s tired. “You can just say Dean’s coming by to detox – ”

It’s still raw to think about why Dean’s been drinking so much lately, so she steadfastly doesn’t, and the sentence ends there. Her eyes dart to her car, parked and safe in the bushes not far away. Just like any other hunt. Everything’s normal.

“It’s, uh, actually not Dean.”

“So, Sam? Is he bringing Eileen?” Claire’s been dying to meet her ever since she’d heard about her, but, well, God had sort of gotten in the way. Still, she’d been brushing up on her ASL, even if it was a little more basic than she’d have liked. She always loved trading hunting stories with other badass girls on the road.

“It’s not Sam either,” Jody says, slowly, and for the first time, Claire picks up on a note of hesitation in her voice. She’s stalling. Why is she stalling?

“Who’s coming, Jody?”

Her car keys nearly slip from her hands at Jody’s answer.

When Claire’s fingers clumsily fumble the catch, the blare of the car’s alarm drowns out any other coherent thought, numbing her for the whole drive over to the motel. Check-in, payment, settling in. Static in her limbs all along the way, body asleep but still moving, no better than a stumbling corpse.

Her body – unclean, disheveled, alone, empty – occupies the space atop the covers of the single bed. Claire Novak is nowhere to be found.

She closes her eyes, but the static only grows louder.

---

The trip back to Sioux Falls is definitely somewhere in the top ten worst drives Claire’s ever taken.

Usually, the long drive is half of what makes a hunt so exciting. In a house with anywhere between two and ten other people in it at any given time, a drive is a chance to hear yourself think. Or not think, if it’s been that kind of a week. Just Claire and the open road; a hand on the wheel, the wind tossing her hair back over the seat, singing along to whatever playlist best suits the vibes of the trip.

But this time? She might as well pick up some hitchhiking penguins for how much it’s the polar opposite.

Three and a half hours pass, silent except for the sound of the engine. Landscapes streak past her windows, but Claire just drives, watching the road and not seeing a thing.

The longer it goes, the louder the static becomes; first in her hands, then spreading up her arms, in her chest, in her head. This time, though, it doesn’t numb her. Instead, her fingers tap a disjointed, nervous beat against the wheel; her breaths come uneven and ragged as she fights against the growing tightness in her chest; the grinding of her teeth rivals the engine for volume in her head.

It’s only when she pulls onto Jody’s street that she realizes that she’s even made it to Sioux Falls in the first place. The familiar environment isn’t even the giveaway – it’s the Impala, parked unassumingly in the driveway, that does it.

What?!

Claire slams the brakes, parking less than gracefully in front of the house. Jody might kill her for it later, but it’s not like that’s gonna make a difference if she’s going down swinging in about ten minutes anyway.

Wonder if Patience could tell me exactly how long it’ll take before everything goes to hell.

“Where is he?” she demands as the door swings open. Jody turns to look at her from her spot at the kitchen sink.

“Well, hi to you too,” she shoots back, but Claire can tell that she’s not feeling it. It’s habit, saying the words because she always does. Jody’s eyes are too full of pity, and Claire doesn’t need anyone’s fucking charity, and the explosion feels like it’s already happened and it’s just racing toward them like shockwaves from a bomb.

Alex, dishtowel in hand, looks between them knowingly and shrugs as she makes to leave. She doesn’t say a single word, which is just fucking like her, until she claps Claire on the back as she heads up the stairs.

“Don’t start something you can’t finish, Rambo.”

“Shut up, Nurse Piccolo,” Claire shoots back reflexively, and finally closes the door behind her as she heads further into the house. Her eyes dart to the living room as she passes, but it’s empty. “Where is he, Jody?”

“Out back,” Jody finally relents, tilting her head toward the window. Before Claire can even think about moving to head out, though, Jody’s firm hand lands hard on her shoulder, grounding her in place. It rankles, her muscles immediately tensing defensively. What gives her the fucking right? “Claire, try to remember it’s not his fault. He just wants to talk. Just hear him out, all right? Hear what he’s got to say.”

Her blood rushes in her ears, white noise growing louder and louder.

“Great pep talk, but in case you haven’t noticed, you’re not actually my mom.” Her voice is rough and dry as sandpaper. She feels like she’s running cold and sweating bullets all at the same time. “I can handle this myself, thanks.”

She ducks and gives a hard jerk forward, ripping herself out from under Jody’s hand.

Alone, a voice whispers in her ear as she stalks out the door and slams it behind her.

The figure in the back garden is crouched down, looking at the dead flowerbed where Jody, Kaia, and Donna planted chrysanthemums this past spring. Back when Kaia had just come back from the bad place, and Claire’s heart had been full to bursting as she leaned against the side of the house and watched them work. Back when everything was good, she’d gotten a semblance of her life back, and she didn’t have any of this shit tearing her apart any time she so much as breathed.

His fingers brush the dried leaves almost reverently as he stands, and Claire snaps like a broken rubber band.

“What are you even doing here?” she says coldly, folding her hands over her chest.

The figure turns, and for the first time since she’d heard about his very existence, Claire sees the face of Lucifer’s bouncing baby bundle of joy staring back at her.

He’s smaller than she expected, only a few inches taller than her – less, even, in her combat boots. His hands are fidgeting now, pulling at the bottom of his jacket like he’s trying to make a good impression on the first day of kindergarten. He’s even dressed like a fucking Winchester, all the layers minus the flannel, like he’s trying to prove a point.

But the most infuriating fucking thing is that he’s standing there, innocent as a goddamn baby, and all she sees are Dad’s eyes looking back at her. Dad’s eyes, and Castiel’s stupid, unwarranted concern in the lines of his face.

And isn’t that just the fucking cherry on top?

Her fist moves before she even has the chance to process what’s happening. But – surprise, surprise – he catches it mid-swing, his palm closing over her fingers, before it can come too near his face.

“Hello,” says Jack Kline, still holding Claire’s fist in one hand while he raises the other in a small wave.

He’s got a gap between his two front teeth. Jesus Christ.

In the second that Claire’s still frozen, he must decide that he’s not done being stupid today, because he opens his mouth again. “My name is –”

“I know who you are,” she snarls, ripping her fist from his hand to hold it at her side, glaring back at him without quite looking at his face. “I said, what the hell are you doing here?”

Even without looking, she can just about hear his eyebrows knit together in confusion and concern. Every frantic beat of her heart sends pain lancing through her chest. She can’t fucking deal with this right now, she needs to hit something, she needs to get so far away from this –

“I wanted to meet you, Claire Novak.”

It’s like some excited kid blew out their birthday candles with all the breath in their little lungs. The fight just goes out of her, runs down her back like melting ice skating its way down her spine, until instead of being wound up with tension, Claire’s just fucking exhausted. What’s even the point anymore?

“Don’t know why,” she says under her breath, shifting her weight onto one hip and tucking a wayward strand of hair behind her ear.

“Because I thought you could help me,” Jack answers earnestly, evidently having heard her grumble and chosen to ignore the reason she didn’t say it out loud to him in the first place.

Claire can’t help it. She snorts derisively, folding her arms over her chest for the second time.

“What could you even need my help with?” she asks, even though realistically there isn’t a good answer to that question. “You’re half-angel, aren’t you? Nephilim. And now you’re literally God, so. You can do whatever the hell you want to do.” She pauses for a second. “And you’ve got Sam and Dean if you need anything else. You don’t need me.”

Jack takes a second, letting her words sink in – clearly it hadn’t been what he was expecting to hear from her. Good. Let me keep him on his toes. Time to dance, kid.

But then he tilts his head just slightly to the side, eyes narrowing as he processes what she’s said, and fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Unbidden, the corners of her eyes start to prickle, tiny stabs from the smallest knives, and her fingers dig marks onto the leather of her jacket sleeve in a desperate grip. Fuck. Don’t think about it, don’t think about it, don’t think about it –

It’s impossible. The kid looks so much like Cas that it’s hard to believe they don’t share any DNA. The past two months of strategic hard work and fragile walls carefully built up around her heart shatter in the seconds it takes for Jack to speak again. Fuck.

“That’s true, but this isn’t something that being omniscient can really resolve,” he muses as Claire fights the urge to scrub at her eyes with the back of her hand. “I think Sam would like to help, but I’d be worried that what I want to ask would be too difficult for him to deal with. And Dean is…” He falters for a moment. “I don’t think Dean likes me very much right now.”

“The Impala’s here, isn’t it?” she says, latching onto the distraction with only the slightest waver in her voice. “Can’t be that mad at you.”

“I drove it here,” Jack answers simply. Claire’s eyes widen despite herself.

He what?!

“You – you drove –”

“Yes,” he says matter-of-factly. The ends of his lips twitch upwards again. “I don’t like flying when I’m on Earth, not if I don’t have to. So I took the Impala from the bunker’s garage since I’ve already practiced driving it.” The smile flickers for just a moment. “I didn’t tell anyone I took it, though. I didn’t want Sam and Dean to know I was here. Do you think it’ll be missed? I didn’t think I’d be too long.”

The information whizzes in through one of Claire’s ears and right out the other. All except –

“You stole the Impala?”

Jack’s hand flies to the back of his neck, rubbing it up and down in an embarrassed move that reads so Dean that it nearly punches the breath out of her again. “I just wanted to come by and ask you a question.” He squints thoughtfully, and the gut punch does hit this time. “I think they would have let me take her.”

This time, she can’t help swiping angrily at the sides of her eyes with her sleeve. Fuck this. This conversation’s all small-talk and pain and it needs to be done yesterday.

“So what are you here for then, huh? What was worth stealing the Impala for?” she says. Her voice only cracks once, which is pretty much a win with how hard she’s losing grip on her sanity. She still can’t even look right at him.

His eyes widen a little, betraying his surprise at the sudden reversal of the conversation. He opens his mouth but then pauses, clearly thinking over whatever he was about to say.

What he does say isn’t any better.

“The last case that Cas and I went on was to investigate this religious group at a community center,” he says, and Claire’s ears start ringing. “Well, the case itself doesn’t really matter. But we had to pretend to be new members of the group and the pastor asked us to share our journey during prayer.”

Jack pauses, and the way his fists clench at his side looks like he’s gathering up the courage to continue. “Cas talked about losing his sense of purpose and not really knowing what to do anymore. But he said that he found himself again in becoming a father.”

Claire can’t help but flinch at the word. She takes a step back, unsteady on her feet, and lets out a watery, incredulous laugh. “Must’ve felt good, huh, wonder boy?”

He tilts his head just like Cas again, just more fucking fuel for the fire.

“Well, yes,” he says slowly, like he’s testing out the words. “But he wasn’t my dad first.”

Her breath catches in her throat.

“I – I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says, another disbelieving laugh slipping through her lips. Her head shakes a no without even a conscious thought to do it. “He wasn’t my dad just because he stole my dad’s body. You’re wrong.”

Her words taste strange coming out of her mouth. She’s not lying – she misses her dad more than anything. She still remembers the last time she saw him, the look on his face, bruised and bloody, looking up at her in desperation as he begged her to take him instead. Claire remembers her fear, her horror, her despair at the thought of her dad leaving again; she remembers Castiel’s calm decisiveness and – even though he was her, even though he was about to take her dad away from her forever, even though he was the world’s number one, top tier, give-the-guy-a-fucking-medal type of jackass – his clumsy attempts to soothe her inside her own head.

There’s nothing to fear, Claire, he’d thought with no small amount of uncertainty, pulling up her most comforting memories to try to make her feel better. The smell of her favourite teddy bear squished into her face when she was cozy, wrapped in her blankets; Christmas around the softly-lit tree, singing carols with her mom and dad; the triumph in her dad’s eyes when she finally got the right answer on the hardest math equation she’d ever had to do. The memories hadn’t helped at all – they’d actively made it worse. He was so fucking stupid. But somehow, he was still trying. Your father will live. He will be serving a greater mission. You will see him again someday, in a better place. Don’t be afraid.

For years afterwards, she’d thought of that whenever she prayed to Castiel to bring him back. He had tried to make her feel better. He couldn’t be all bad. He was going to bring her dad back.

It didn’t take long after her mother started drinking herself to sleep every night for Claire to give up on that idea.

Castiel, douchebag of the Lord, hadn’t even thought twice before he as good as took both of her parents away from her.

She’d tried thinking of that when Sam had called, two months ago, to gently tell them that Cas was gone. She’d tried to remember the anger and the disgust and the absolute, endless hatred at what he’d done to her family. It wasn’t hard; those feelings still fought their way past her carefully constructed barriers around that time in her life whenever she let herself think about it. The problem was, that wasn’t all there was anymore.

He’d broken her out of the foster system, even though he was the world’s worst liar, even if he’d had no idea what the hell he was doing, even if he was doing it more out of guilt than anything else. He’d remembered her birthday, and gotten her a gift – even if it was just a stupid toy from Hot Topic. He listened for her prayers. He texted her with a frankly excessive amount of emojis, and no matter where he was or what either of them were doing, he always made sure to send her good morning and goodnight texts.

Dad had been kind, gentle. He’d kiss Claire’s forehead before bed every night, and even when she’d gotten older, he’d still sometimes make the time to read her bedtime stories. He’d help her when she got stuck on schoolwork. If he ever had to leave for a conference, he’d always bring her a little something from wherever he’d been, just to remind her that she was always in his heart no matter where he went.

Cas never pretended like he could make up for what he’d done, because he knew there was no way he could. He never acted like she owed him anything. He didn’t hold anything against her even when he probably should have. He apologized, and didn’t expect her to forgive him or want anything to do with him afterwards.

He’d tried to comfort her.

Castiel, angel of the Lord, couldn’t have been James Novak even if he had tried. He would never be able to fill the empty void Jimmy had left in Claire’s life, the space that Castiel himself had created in the name of Heaven’s great plan.

That didn’t mean that, with all the shit they’d been through in the last few years, he couldn’t have slowly become – in the strangest, most incomprehensible, most fucked-up of ways – something like a father to her.

It’s the first time she’s let herself even consider the thought.

Jack meets her eyes uncertainly in the silence, somehow looking nothing like Jimmy Novak and everything like Castiel all at once.

It’s still for a moment, all except for Claire’s lungs working overtime to catch a breath, until a small noise pierces the air. It happens again and again, unpredictable and erratic, and there’s a second where she half-wonders where it’s coming from before Jack moves to extend a hesitant hand out toward her and abruptly stops himself in mid-air, unsure what to do next.

Oh. That’s me.

It’s only then that Claire tastes the saltwater on her lips; only then that she realizes that she’s been shaking with sobs she’s only barely been able to hold back. She’s still standing, but it’s a close call, if she’s gonna be honest with herself. And she might as well be, now.

“Claire?” Jack tries gently, hesitantly. With that, it’s like the blood in her veins catches a spark, lighting her up in an uncontrollable blaze. She doesn’t need his pity. She can’t stand him tiptoeing around her like she’s some sort of fucking wild animal, can’t stand his small voice when he talks to her, can’t stand him looking at her with his eyes –

“How does Dean even look at you?”

It tumbles out of her mouth in a rush, a tangled mess of thorns that she can’t stop herself from throwing in his face, and the worst part of it is that it’s true.

Jack’s the one who flinches this time. He takes a step backwards, and he opens his mouth like he’s trying to say something, but nothing comes out. Claire doesn’t know if she wants to laugh or cry.

“You look so much like him, you know that?” is what she settles on saying, and he flinches again, looking away. She laughs humourlessly. “Nobody told me. I hear all kinds of stories about the new kid – the special-est little boy – Cas’ son, but no one thinks I might wanna know that he doesn’t look jack shit like his biological dad down under – no, he looks just like mine.”

Jack’s eyes widen in something half like surprise, half like horror. His lips part silently, but she beats him to it.

“And you know what the funniest part is?” she continues, voice growing louder. “The funniest part is that sure, it fucking hurts to see bits and pieces of him in your face. But you know what I realized? Even with all that, it’s not really Dad you look like.”

She looks up at him, into those piercing blue eyes that she’s only ever seen on one other person, and holds his gaze, however shaky it might be.

“Dad’s been gone twelve years. That wasn’t his body anymore. That was Cas.”

Her breaths are ragged, her fingers trembling, but she can’t stop now that she’s started. It’s like a boulder rolling at top speed down a hill, a chemical chain reaction rushing to explode. “He never moved like Dad did, never smiled like him even though it was the same face. You’re just like him. I look at you and all I can see is his stupid face – ”

It feels like she’s falling apart.

“They’re both gone. They’re – they weren’t even – ” Another sharp, dead laugh bursts from her chest. “How good of a father was either of them? When my dad gave us up, gave up his family because a voice in his head told him he was special? When Cas – when Castiel left, and couldn’t look me in the eyes, and started over with a different, better kid so he could be a real dad?”

“He talked about you all the time.”

The words are soft, but somehow they still stab Claire like a silver dagger to the heart.

“What?”

“Cas talked about you,” Jack repeats, this time a little louder. “He didn’t pretend like you didn’t exist just because I lived with him and you were living here.”

All she can do is blink. Her throat tightens, each dry swallow burning its way down her chest.

“I don’t know what a father is supposed to be,” Jack says simply. “I don’t know if Cas was a good one, to either of us. He left me behind, too. And it’s my fault he’s gone.”

Claire looks back at him, standing there unsteadily, and – for the first time, the only time in this whole exchange so far – Jack looks real.

“That’s not – ” she tries, but he shakes his head.

“He made a deal to save me. I’d rather not be dead, I guess, but Cas made himself unhappy so he could stay here, and when the time came, he left without saying goodbye.”

She remembers Cas driving slow beside her as they talked, Cas putting himself between her and whatever danger was threatening them this time, holding her when her heart was shattering and she didn’t know what she was even feeling. Her phone burns a hole in her pocket with one last “Good morning 🌞, Claire” that she thought she’d have more time to answer.

“I just wanted to know what he was like,” Jack says, and it takes Claire a second to realize that he’s still talking to her. “With you.”

The silence hangs heavy between them. They look at each other, a growing chasm at their feet that neither can cross alone. Claire feels it cracking in time with her heartbeat as she looks back at Jack’s open expression, and she makes a choice.

“He was an idiot,” she says, throwing a rope over the aching canyon to cross the distance. Jack, wide-eyed, holds to it like a lifeline, hanging rapturously onto her every word. “He had to pretend to be my dad once and it was like he’d never met a real person in his life. I don’t think he knew how to exist around a teenager.” She pauses, and for the first time today, Claire Novak feels a small smile tug at the edges of her mouth. “He gave me a Grumpy Cat plushie for my eighteenth birthday.”

“Really?” Jack tentatively offers a smile back. “He got me Marvellous Marvin the Talking Teddy for mine.”

“Are you serious?” Well, fuck. This time, though still incredulous, Claire’s laugh is genuine. “Man, he has one idea and he sticks to it, huh?”

“Sounds like it,” Jack answers, and he lets out a small laugh too.

“He didn’t know what he was doing most of the time, but… he was trying, I guess,” she says slowly, finally trying to put a name to the wall crumbling to pieces around her heart. “We were both trying, even though it was probably the most fucked up relationship in the world. Sometimes I still don’t know how I feel about everything.” Her shoulders sag with exhaustion, but she still manages a shrug. “Right now, mostly, I miss him.”

“Yeah,” Jack says, voice breaking on the word. When Claire looks, really looks at him, she can see the tears gathering at the corners of his eyes like she’s looking into a mirror. “Same here.”

It’s a split second decision, but somehow, it still feels like the moment she makes it stretches into forever.

Before she really knows what she’s doing, Claire takes a step forward, and then another, and one more. When she’s close enough, she takes a deep, shaky breath and lets it out into a long sigh.

“C’mere,” she mumbles, and pulls Jack toward her. He stumbles, startled, but before long his arms gently close around her just like how she’s holding him, two kids in the world’s most awkward hug.

When she hears a small sniffle from right beside her ear, though, she knows she made the right choice.

“Thank you,” comes his small voice, and his fingers squeeze just a little tighter into the leather of her jacket. “Thank you, Claire.”

“All right, all right,” she answers, voice thick in her throat. Be cool, Novak. “Can it, beanstalk.”

Jack laughs again, breathless and a little watery.

Nailed it.

***

When they’ve both run out of stories to share, the silence between them isn’t nearly as loaded as it was at the start. They’re sitting at the edge of the flowerbed, typing their numbers into each other’s phones, when a car door slams shut at the front of the house.

It’s Claire that looks up first at the sound, her brows furrowed.

“I don’t think Jody was expecting anybody today,” she says, but before she can think it through, Jack freezes beside her.

“Jack?”

“Thank you, Claire,” he whispers, handing her phone back and gently taking his as he stumbles to his feet. “If you ever want to talk, you can always text me. I’m pretty sure there’s service in Heaven.” He frowns for a moment, considering. “If texting doesn’t work, you can always pray to me. I’ll always be able to hear you.”

“Whoa, what’s with the curtain call?” she says as she stands, dusting the dirt off her jeans. “What’s going on?”

It’s then that she hears voices floating out of the open kitchen window, and it doesn’t take long to put the rest together.

“It’s Sam and Dean,” Jack whispers anyway, unnecessarily. “I told Jody not to tell anyone except you that I was coming, but Sam must have noticed the Impala was missing. I can’t stay.”

“You don’t want them knowing you’re here?” Claire asks just as quietly.

He’s back to tugging on the hem of his jacket with a hand, his eyes darting fast as lightning between Claire and the kitchen window. The breath he lets out is shaky, and he can’t quite make eye contact with her anymore.

“I don’t know how to save Cas,” he admits, and even though she’d figured it had to be something like that, the disappointment still stings, somewhere deep down. “I can’t yet. I can’t see them until I’ve found a way.”

It doesn’t really make sense – dumb as the Winchesters can be, would they really hold something like this against Jack? – until she hears the clinking of glass and the sound of the front door again, and suddenly it all clicks into place, right alongside the worry and sadness in Jack’s eyes when she’d mentioned Dean’s name earlier. She nods without a word, but taps her phone back as her own reminder.

A wave of relief breaks over Jack’s face, and he nods back, a small smile on his lips and a hand raised in a wave goodbye. He’s gone a moment later, and Claire’s left standing there, alone, looking at the back door.

She knows what comes next, even though she’s had enough of feelings for one day, thank you very much. But this is how Cas has left his family, and there’s no use crying over spilled milk about it.

Time to pick up the pieces.

“…we’re not trying to smother him,” Sam’s voice is saying as she walks past the side of the house. “I just – we just want to know if he’s okay.”

“He’ll be back when he’s ready, Sam,” Jody’s voice answers, gentle from lived experience, and Claire’s heart stumbles over a beat from the tidal wave of guilt washing over her.

Despite that, she keeps walking, steps steady even when nothing else in the world is. It’s not long before she makes it to the front yard and catches sight of a figure leaning, slouched, against the Impala.

The bottle Dean’s holding is hanging loosely from his fist at his side, and he’s turned away from her so she can’t see his expression. It’s been awhile since Claire’s seen him around – Jody must know better than to put them in close range after what happened two months ago. Still, she feels something like déjà vu as she sees the defeat in his slumped shoulders, hears the beer clinking against the door of the car.

It only takes another second for it to hit her like a freight train. She’s seen this movie before – she knows how this one plays out. Even though they couldn’t look more different, for one long, heartwrenching moment, it’s her mom standing there by the car, about to leave her behind for another doomed wild goose chase.

Sorry, Clairebear, Mom’s gotta get going now. Be good for Nana, okay? Mom and Dad are gonna be back soon.

She’s pretty sure Rotten Tomatoes would rate it into the negatives, as far as endings go. Claire may not have been able to escape it for herself, but she’ll be damned if she lets Dean take up the starring role in the hotly anticipated sequel.

And, well, fuck. It’s enough that she’d been surprise cast into the little horror show her life had become. Jack shouldn’t be forced onto the casting couch from hell either.

Dean’s silhouette slumps a little further as he lets out a sigh, and Claire’s resolve cements itself deep in her chest.

As she moves closer to the Impala, two things become clear to her. The first is that she can tell now that Dean’s watching the setting sun, looking at the horizon without seeing much of anything. His jaw twitches and his lips move soundlessly, almost as if he’s trying to say something, but no words make it out.

The second is that the keys to the junker the two of them drove here are still in its ignition.

Well, fuck it.

Looks like today’s theme is bad decisions, she thinks wryly.

It takes less than a minute for Claire to create a group with Sam and Jody’s numbers in it and text them a quick apology, and then she’s sliding her phone into her back pocket as she draws close enough to grab Dean’s arm.

“All right, old man,” she says, and pulls hard.

Startled, Dean comes away from the Impala with a grunt. It takes a second for his eyes to find Claire’s, and another for them to focus enough to make sense of what he’s seeing.

“Hey, kid,” he says, and fuck. His voice might as well be sandpaper. She can see him trying, though – in another moment, he manages to rearrange his expression so it looks passably like a smile if she squints real hard. The look on his face makes her chest feel tight with an emotion she can’t name. “Long time no see, huh?”

“Sure has,” she answers, and, putting all her weight behind it, she yanks him in the direction of the passenger seat of the Men of Letters’ courtesy car. Dean stumbles, but just like she’d been hoping, he trips toward the door. “Don’t worry, though. We’re about to have a really long catch-up sesh.”

***

It’s an hour and a half into the drive back to Lebanon that Dean finally starts sobering up enough to fully understand what’s happening.

“You left Baby back in South Dakota?!”

“Oh, calm down, princess,” Claire says with a roll of her eyes. Drama queen. “Sam’s the only one you’d let drive her back, anyway. It’s not like you were sober enough to do it.”

The silence that falls over the car is the most awkward it’s been between the two of them since the mini-golf incident all those years ago.

Dean slumps back into the passenger seat with a heavy sigh, and when Claire makes no move to continue, he goes back to staring sightlessly out the window at the twilight, slowly slipping away into darkness to the tune of a soft pattering of raindrops on the roof.

They’re driving down a dimly lit two-lane, a wall of clouds casting pitch darkness on the highway, when Claire speaks next.

“You’re gonna have to talk about it at some point, Dean.”

He snorts derisively without looking at her. “Yeah? So what, you’re about to go all Doctor Phil on me now that we’re trapped in a car for another hour?”

“Fuck no,” she says emphatically, knuckles bone white on the steering wheel. “We are not having this conversation.”

“ ’s different when it’s on you, huh,” he mumbles into his jacket, and Claire stares out at the blackness where the road ends, just outside the faint outline of the car’s headlights. Another long silence steals over the two of them, and Claire drives on.

“I’m not the one that needs to hear it,” she says, finally.

Dean doesn’t answer – at least, not aloud. His shoulders hunch further inward, and she resolutely pretends not to hear his jagged, uneven breathing piercing the dark.

They don’t speak again until they’re less than twenty minutes out from the bunker.

“It’s not like I don’t see it,” Dean murmurs, barely audible over the sound of the engine.

“See what?” comes Claire’s careful answer, taking a corner a little more sharply than she should have.

“Sammy,” he says incomprehensibly, and before she can even begin to process what’s happening, he’s putting his head in his hands, digging the heels of his palms into his eyes. “He thinks I’m like him.”

“Like –”

“No,” Dean snaps vehemently before she can even say his name. “Not him. Like John.”

“John?”

“Turning into Dad,” he says, so quietly Claire almost doesn’t hear it. The streetlights of Lebanon pass over his face, from the black of night to warm yellow to black again, and silently, Claire pretends not to notice the shimmer of tears on his cheeks.

---

It’s too late to drive back to Sioux Falls by the time Dean’s stumbled into bed, but before he passes out cold on top of the sheets, he tells her to pick a room and make herself comfortable.

It’s not like Claire’s turning down the offer; she’s just too wired to sleep, her brain whirring at a hundred miles a minute, trying and failing not to feel the emotions stuck in her throat. There are no bedtime stories tonight, nothing to distract her in a blank room that’s been unchanged for seventy years. Tonight, the static’s gone, replaced with restless adrenaline and a heart on the verge of collapse.

It doesn’t take much tossing and turning for Claire to make the executive decision that trying to sleep is pretty much useless right now.

Even though she really doesn’t need to be – an elephant stampeding outside his door wouldn’t have a chance of waking Dean right now – she’s light on her feet as she slips out of the room and down the hallway.

Dean’s is the only door that’s closed; through one that’s half-open, she catches a glimpse of one of Sam’s bags strewn across his bed, at least a dozen books scattered across his sheets, his desk, the floor. There’s another nearly empty one next, except for a few plaid shirts hanging in the open closet and a glasses case by the bed. Through another, posters litter the walls, there’s a pair of headphones folded up on the night table, and a tank lies empty on the desk. So it goes.

The room after that has its door flung wide open, so really, it’s practically begging for her to take a closer look. On first glance, it’s just the same as every other room; double bed, a night table on either side, a desk, a closet. Nothing looks any different from what her room looks like, or at least not until she overbalances on her heel-turn back toward the door, throws her arm out to steady herself, and feels her hand meet fabric instead of wood on the desk chair.

It’s just a regular army green jacket, like any number of the ones Dean’s worn around before. There’s the corner of what looks like a thin rectangle of black plastic just peeking out of the pocket facing her – if she had to guess, it looks like one of the millions of cassette tapes she’s seen Dean stash away in a mangled box tucked under the Impala’s front passenger seat.

Is he using this as a second room?

Nothing else looks lived in, so it takes her until she finally turns to leave again to notice the tiny blue triangle of fabric caught on the edge of the upper desk drawer. Now that doesn’t look like anything of Dean’s– he doesn’t usually wear much blue – so, against her better judgment, she pulls the drawer unstuck to see what it is.

The first thing that she processes is that it’s not all blue; the fabric alternates diagonal blue and white stripes from one tip to the other.

The second is a memory.

As the fabric nearly slips from her hands, Claire sees it knotted messily, feels her fingers tugging it one way and then the other to tighten it up; hears her own voice, loud and dissonant, echoing in her ears.

Not that you care, but I like you better in a tie.

She’s gone before she even realizes she’s moving.

When the cool, quiet night air hits her face, it feels like her mind finally comes to a stop. Ever so slowly, Claire lowers herself to sit, cross-legged, on the cold concrete of the bunker’s roof; the moon stares, uncaring, down at her through the incoming clouds, lighting up the slight shake in her hands, her trembling fingers still gripping the stupid tie. If she looks closely enough, she can see the usual bright dot that she knows means Jupiter directly above the crescent. Absently, she wonders if Jack is looking at the same sky; if he’s seeing the same stars in reverse, a mirror image, if he’s looking down at them from above.

The planet turns, the galaxy spins, and Cas is still gone.

“Hey, Cas,” she murmurs to the air, her voice barely above a whisper. “You’re a real fucking asshole, you know that?”

Looking down at the tie in her hands – the ghost of a memory that someone couldn’t bear to salt and burn and let go – Claire takes in a deep, shuddering breath and then exhales slowly, on a countdown like Kaia taught her one day after she came back from therapy, lying down on her bed with their fingers entwined. It’s only after a few repetitions, once her heartbeat slows, that she finds her voice again.

“Dear Cas, who art in Heaven,” she starts, and then snorts past the lump suddenly blocking her throat. “Well, not anymore, I guess. Um. I’m gonna start over, okay? Sorry,” she adds, suddenly self-conscious.

“Dear Cas, who art in something called the Empty, according to Sam. You’re probably not able to hear this, but, um, figured it never hurts to try.” She cringes, squeezing her eyes shut. “Ugh, this is so fucking stupid.”

What can you even tell your kind of father figure who, if you’re playing the odds, will never even hear a thing you’re saying?

“Fuck you, Cas,” she says instead, ignoring the way her voice wavers. “You left us all behind. Jack thinks it’s his fault you’re gone. Dean thinks it’s his instead. And you know what? I don’t even know if either of them is right, because you never said anything, you fucking asshole, you never told anyone!

“I’m not – not stupid enough to blame myself. I already knew I made it hard for you to stay. If it – if it was my fault, you’d have left a long time ago.” She takes another uneven breath in a doomed attempt to steady herself. “But you never cared that I made your life hell. The only thing you ever thought about was how you ruined mine.

“And I don’t – look, Cas, I don’t know if I can ever forgive and forget,” she pleads desperately, and fuck, it doesn’t matter how hard she’s trying, she’s still going to cry. “You have to understand that. That was my family, Cas.”

She falters, looking up at the stars again. The cold air prickles her skin, smelling faintly of incoming rain. The tie still trembles in her hands. “But so were you.”

There’s no answer but the clouds swallowing up the last of the moonlight, leaving her alone in the darkness, and the little that’s left of her composure shatters.

“How the fuck am I supposed to feel?” she shouts into the night. “You tell me, if you know so much – if you’re calling the shots – fucking tell me!”

It’s like the air changes, even though she knows there’s no one listening. A sudden breeze whips her hair across her face; it catches, sticking in the tears streaking down her cheeks. Her whole body shudders with silent sobs.

Somewhere far away, a clap of thunder shakes the earth.

#Claire Novak #Castiel #Jack Kline #November 5th #Supernatural #destiel #my writing #this was theoretically meant to come out on the 5th but I got lost in my perfectionism and have spent the days since editing and re-editing #also since most of it was written in a fugue state on the 5th itself it was maybe a stretch to think I'd actually post it same day #whoo baby this is the second longest fic I've ever written!!! a very close second!!!#thank you to the CW's Supernatural for making me insane #also yes you are supposed to read the last bit set to Snow Patrol's The Lightning Strike (What If This Storm Ends?)#ANYWAY ::drops this here and runs::

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