Sorry

"Okay, Cas, we're going to play this board game.  It's called Sorry or something.  How the Hell do you play this thing…"

Dean glared at the instructions, then tossed the box lid aside.  "Okay, screw this, let's just play.  The doctor says you need…stimulation or something?  I don't know.  Sam's taking care of some third-rate monster right now, so we have some time.  So let's play this thing."

Cas stared forward.  Dean faltered a little bit.

"Uh…okay.  You can be blue, you like blue right?  And I'll be yellow- okay, no, yellow sucks.  Uh, I'll be red."

Dean placed the pieces on the board, carefully arranging the cards.

"Okay, you have four, I have four.  You get…five cards," Dean put five cards facedown by Cas, who still didn't move.  Dean paused, looking at the angel.  Cas looked deflated.  Cas looked small.

Dean shook his head.  "And I get five," he continued, dealing out five more cards to himself.

Dean looked at his cards.  "I guess I'll go first, unless you say otherwise," Dean said, looking up, hoping a little that Cas would say something.  Anything.  That he would stop staring through Dean.

He grimaced.  "Fine, I'll go."  He placed a card in the discard pile.  "Yes, ten squares, Hell yes.  Your sorry ass is going down, Cas."  He grinned boyishly and moved the pawn forward.  "Already closer to home," he added.

"Your turn," he said, looking over at Cas.  When the angel didn't move, Dean shrugged and peeked at Cas's cards.  "Oh dude, an eleven?  You are on fire today," he said, then stopped.  Cas's eyes had flickered a little, or had Dean been imagining it?

Dean counted the spaces out loud, his tongue in the corner of his mouth.  He continued to play for both himself and his friend.  When it looked like Cas's third pawn was going to slide Dean's off the board, Dean causally ignored that bit of info.  "Like Hell you're going to knock me off," Dean grumbled.

The sun was starting to set, and the rec room was beginning to darken.  Dean and Cas were soon the only two left, not counting the orderlies.

Neither Dean nor Cas had gotten any pawns to home yet, and Dean was beginning to get frustrated.

"Look, Cas, you're almost home.  You gotta say something, though, you know?  Uh, like, it's in the rules, I think."  He grabbed the top of the box again and pretended to read the instructions again.  "Yeah, it's like Yahtzee, you have to say 'Sorry!' before going into the safe zone thing."

Dean looked at Cas.  Cas had three pawns still on the board.  Dean, refusing to move anymore of his own pawns out of the start, had only one.

"You're winning!" Dean said halfheartedly.  After a moment, he added, "You don't have to say 'Sorry' to get to the home.  I made that rule up."

Cas cocked his head ever so slightly.  Something inside Dean's chest clenched, white-hot.

Cas looked down at the board, slouched over.

Dean gritted his teeth, his whole body shaking slightly, the way it did whenever he got so angry he needed to punch something.  Anything.  Anyone.

"Say something," Dean said, his voice strained, quiet, almost…pitiful.

Cas didn't look at him.

Dean shoved the board sideways, violently, the pawns flying, the cards scattering.

A single blue pawn remained on the table, Cas staring at it intently.  Dean froze, his eyes wide.  Cas looked up at him.

"You know I can never go home, Dean," he whispered.