When Cas wakes up alone, she concludes that the likeliest explanations are: Deanna got in a fight with a bottle of Jack Daniels; Deanna got in a fight with Cas’s sister that put one or both of them into the ER; and Deanna got in a fight with a bottle of Jack Daniels, and followed it by getting into a fight with gravity.
Whatever the cause, though, she knows Deanna can handle herself, and so Cas sighs, fumbles into her yoga pants and her baby blue hooded sweatshirt with EDLUND UNIVERSITY emblazoned on the chest in black, her sneakers. The sun’s creaking over the horizon and it’s time for Cas’s run, about the only time she gets to have to herself at all and more so given that it’s winter break. She creeps down the stairs, grabs her ipod off the kitchen table, and as she means to leave, she catches a glimpse of something off…
“Deanna…? It’s seven in the morning…” Cas rubs her eyes and blinks into the living room, at the slim, slouching silhouette of her girlfriend, just sitting there on Blaire’s sofa in her pajamas, curled up under a blanket and watching cartoons. From the looks of it, a Saturday morning marathon of Spongebob Squarepants.
Deanna doesn’t look up, doesn’t move, doesn’t react at all. Nothing like Deanna Mary Winchester, at least… not the one Cas knows, not the one she’s dated for a year-and-a-half. She doesn’t look much like herself, either, all pale and still. The askew hair would look fairly normal, if not for how she has her knees up around her chin and how she keeps nibbling at her nails. Dark circles hang under her moss-green eyes, which barely seem to blink; they just stare at the faint glow of the TV. And maybe it’s just a trick of the light — Cas hopes it’s just a trick of the light — but are her cheekbones sharper? Has Cas missed this until now?
Cas wrinkles her nose and takes out the earbuds, drops the mp3 player into her kangaroo pocket — and she says again, louder this time, “…Deanna? Are you… have you even gone to bed?” When Deanna still doesn’t respond, Cas sighs. She toes off her sneakers and shuffles over to the couch, flops down next to Deanna and leans on her girlfriend’s shoulder. (Underneath her cheek, Deanna’s shoulder feels pointier, but Cas files this fact away for later. When Deanna’s not being worrisome.) “…I missed you last night,” she says and nuzzles at Deanna.
Finally, Deanna speaks as though she’s stuck in amber, like she has to drag every syllable, every motion of lips and teeth, out kicking and screaming: “…I think I might’ve ordered my Dad a Tony Little Gazelle last night. He’s been bitching about, I don’t know, some, ‘I’m middle-aged, it’s showing, plus my side of the family’s stocky, just look at your sister’ shit, and the infomercial was there…”
Cas lifts her head off Deanna’s shoulder, just to blink at her in utter confusion. Even the explanation about it being some kind of home-exercise device doesn’t do much — so she just shakes her head and says, “Why didn’t you come to bed?”
Deanna shrugs. “Tried. After you fell asleep. Sorta tossed and turned for a while, then wound up out here… Couldn’t sleep out here, either, and like. I tried tea. I tried milk. I tried NyQuil… I didn’t try the Black Jack, but I seriously considered it, and… there were infomercials, I guess? And I… I found cartoons. The Disney Channel saves all of their classic reruns for freaking four AM… why does Lucy even get The Disney Channel?”
“I imagine it’s simply a part of the cable package,” Cas says, leaning up to kiss her girlfriend’s cheek. “Come on… I’ll skip my run and make us breakfast, how’s that sound?”
All Deanna does is shrug again — a distressingly nonchalant response to an offer of food — but… she doesn’t fight when Cas takes her hand and tugs her into the kitchen. And she eats, she perks up when she eats. Even if the lack of sleep’s clearly drawn on her face, the eggs and bacon put the color back in her cheeks, and before she’s even done, she’s back to complaining about how she can’t grope Cas’s as well as she likes in her yoga pants. …And that’s a good thing, right? That she’s acting like herself?
Sighing, Cas sips her coffee, takes in the morning newspaper, tries to ignore both Deanna’s questions (“Hey, hey, Cas… which bra are you wearing today? …Hey, Cas, are you wearing the panties with, ‘Hottie’ on the ass? …Hey, Cas, can we do it in Lucy’s bed when she goes out? I’m still pissed off that she said I’m not good enough for you…”) and the nagging thought that, maybe, everything isn’t okay.
