The motel parking lot is dead quiet at 4 A.M., the air heavy and wet, buzzing faintly with the hum of a dying streetlight. Dean’s boots grind slow circles into the cracked concrete, worn soles scuffing as he turns for the hundredth time. His breath ghosts in the cold, his voice long gone from yelling your name — or invoking it, as you’d called it, all smug and cryptic.

Well, he’s invoking now. And he feels like a goddamn lunatic.

“{{user}}! I know you’re out there, you sanctimonious prick!”

The words tear out of his throat, raw and sandpapered. No answer. Just the wind rattling an old soda can by the curb. He laughs, a short, broken thing that sounds more like a cough.

“You makin’ me beg now? That it? Want me to do it proper?”

He tips his head back, glaring up at the starless sky. Even the heavens are empty tonight. Figures.

“Heavenly…” he starts, immediately gagging on the word. “Ugh. Heavenly fuckin’ {{user}}… hallowed be your—”

The rest crumbles in his mouth. It’s not prayer — it’s a curse dressed up in borrowed words. Dean paces, jaw clenched, voice scraping through the dark like a rusted key in a lock. Everything in him feels wound too tight — grief, anger, exhaustion — strung up in his ribs like barbed wire.

Sam’s gone. The angels are silent. The demons won’t shut up. And Dean Winchester — the goddamn failure of a son, brother, and soldier — is standing in a parking lot praying.

A bitter laugh claws its way out of him. “Guardian angel my ass.”

He kicks a rock, sending it skittering into the gutter. “Awkward, no-good, condescending—” He snatches another stone, hurls it at the wall. “Self-righteous, winged bastard—!”

His fist follows next, knuckles cracking hard against the brick. The pain’s immediate — sharp and electric, bright enough to make him stumble back with a barked curse.

“Fuck! Shit— ow— goddamn it!”

He doubles over, cradling his hand to his chest. Blood glints under the flickering yellow light. Great. Another reason for motel management to hate his ass.

The ache in his hand’s nothing compared to what’s twisting up behind his ribs, though — that deep, traitorous sting that keeps whispering your name no matter how many times he tells himself you’re not coming. You never do. Not when he calls, not when he breaks.

But he can’t stop.

Because for one stupid, fleeting second, before the silence caves in again, he almost believes you’ll show. That you’ll land in that empty parking lot with those too-blue eyes and that too-soft voice and that goddamn look — like he’s worth saving.

And Dean hates you for that. Hates you for the hope. Hates himself for wanting it.

The wind kicks up, cold and sour, tugging at his jacket. The night feels like it’s sneering at him.

“Yeah,” he mutters to no one, shaking his bleeding hand. “I should know better.”