Archive of Our Own ^beta

Sam suffered from severe night terrors, only, that definition gave him the blessing of falsehood. These were not scary ideas he had the pleasure of denying when he woke, because they were real. They happened to him and now they hunted him down.

One sharp breath was all he spared before he went completely static. The angel watching over him looked at the source, vessel eyes seeing his barest features blurred in shadow, true eyes seeing the petrified fear.

Sam’s hazel gaze had gone impossibly wide under the distant haze- whatever he was seeing it wasn’t the ceiling. Mouth a straight yet quivering line.

Castiel wilted, announcing his presence with a delicate “Sam?”

He didn’t respond, nor did he breathe. He was stiff as a corpse in the sheets beside Castiel.

Eyebrows furrowing, he raised one hand an inch above his eyes and used the other to flick the overhead light on. Once the light had sufficiently bled beneath his shadow, so as not to fully penetrate the sleep sensitive pupils, he removed his hand.

Sam eased in the way candle wax did under the first lick of flame. He was just as tense as before only this time there was hope for near change.

“Sam?” He repeated, a notch louder than before to match the new intensity under the faux sun.

Still shell shocked, he managed one twitch, body receiving the calls but unable to reciprocate. Castiel took his hand beneath the sheets, slow and gentle. He shifted the blanket away from where they were connected so should Sam manage a peek he would be reassured that it was Castiel and Castiel alone touching him.

He grazed a finger over the ridges of bone. “I am here Sam. I’ve got you.”

Sam squeezed back.

Castiel watched him, as he so often did. He did not force him to do anything other than exist in the knowledge that he was not alone. He rubbed his hand so the feeling was never muted, constant reminders of his angelic presence.

Sam was lost in the colossal stretch of hungry void that made up his shattered mind. He was a hundred years away from the soft bed beside his lover. Beaten and violated on the burning cold caged floor. One single light shone in it, one single flicker of warmth in his right hand.

He held it tightly, protecting it in the center of his body that he curled to form a human shield.

It whispered beautiful sentiments of love and patience and he bled and cried and sobbed into it.

Twenty four minutes limped by. Castiel watched the life and death of a tear from its shaking rise in the tear-duct to its stain in the fabric of Sam’s gray sleep shirt. He  hummed a tender praise, encouraging the emotion to crawl its way back into his lovers empty body.

“Come back to me Sam.” he laid his other hand over their already intertwined pair. “I’m here.”

The next breath came out wobbling, a newborn taking their first uncertain steps.

“I’m here Sam.”

His eyes finally shut. His grip crescendoed to its most constricting, proving his own thoughts wrong when the hand didn’t fade to ash.

He moved slowly, limps having not fully defrosted the gripping fear. Castiel lowered himself out of his sitting position at a matching pace.

They met in the middle and Sam pressed against him. The warmth the hand had given him making his starved body gluttonous for more. He wanted to be enveloped in that warmth even if it burned him alive.

Castiel let him spread over like moss reclaiming an old trunk. He let him lay his head against his collarbone, each ragged breath dusting over his bare skin. He let his arms entangle his body, clutching around his sides before ending on his shoulders. He let his legs slip easily beneath his own to feel the pressure of another.

He winded his own arms like flowering vines, one around his top and the other around his lower back. He leaned his head to rest easily over Sam’s, his content breaths rocking the brunette hair.

“I got you.”

Sam’s response was reduced by aftershock to a whimper. Disbelieving and hurt by fabricated possibilities.

“It’s okay.” Castiel kissed whatever he could reach, peppering his hairline. “You’re safe. I’ve got you.”

Sam craved the sun, he craved the heat. He curled his legs into fetal position, spilling over Castiels side. His hands retracting close to his chest but palms still pressed against his lover. He felt the beating pulse through his hand and up his arm straight to his mind as an anecdote. Castiel readjusted his lower hand to hold his legs, hand resting on Sam’s thigh.

Castiel flicked the light back off with his wing, invisible to the human perception. He felt tightened holds on his shirt and immediately he turned them back on.

Sam relaxed once more in the light.

“Sorry.” Castiel kissed him again.

Sam’s voice cracked with effort to respond “Not your fault.”

“Nobody’s fault.” Castiel agreed. His hand raised slightly to tuck loose strands back, caressing Sam’s cheek. Sam melted under the touch, nestling closer in the crook of his neck.

Castiel continued his small movements. He combed his hair, he kissed his head, he reminded him of his own safety, he held him protectively close and affectionately tender.

He felt the increases in heart rate spikes on random and sensing the turmoil he added “I’m not going anywhere” to the rotation of affirmations.

Sam’s fluttering eyelashes tickled his neck. He thumbed his cheek just to feel the sigh of ease it brought.

“Rest, Sam. You will not leave my arms nor this room unless you choose.” His voice was low and rumbly like a bout of distant thunder. It reminded Sam of musical raindrops on a car windshield and pillowing fog.

His eyes drooped closed and stayed there, his hold eventually fading. His full trust in Castiel to keep his word and keep him safe.

Even in his uncertain state he believed the older man when he said everything would be okay. He believed he would be okay. Castiel would not hurt him.

When he woke up again, he was right where he was promised he’d be. He was tucked in Castiels hold as gently as a swaddled baby. He was warm both outside and in. His first sight was the same chest he’d closed his eyes on. His first sensation was pleased. His first thought was ‘I wish I could stay here forever’

Castiel watched his first stir to his groggy eyes locking on his. He smiled and relished the way his chapped lips smiled back. He stored the sight in his most precious folder of memories.

The ones with Sam in an early morning rising in the solitude of safety they’d built together. Of Sam stripping his bloody layers of fear and shame to the most authentic purity. Of Sam’s head on his lap late in the night. Of Sam’s hair with bubbles braided in beneath a running shower.

Castiel cupped his face with all the carefulness one would regard a priceless vase with. He let Sam move forward first and accepted the kiss he felt bloom on his lips.

Sam moved back against him, breathing him in and breathing his nightmare out. Castiel would hold him forever and never feel a single millisecond wasted. He’d lived an eternity before but he had never breathed until it had been Sam he was taking in. He refused any outside thought now that he’d filled his head with the most sacred of moments.

Love in an incomprehensible way.

Castiel couldn’t help but tilt his sleepy head back up and kiss every surface until the first sounds of the day became incredulous giggling.

“Cas” Sam held the back of his head, putting their foreheads together “I haven’t brushed my teeth yet.”

“Neither have I”

“Gross” he kissed his stubbled jawline.