I jump to my feet. "Olivia," I say, startled. Panic rises in my chest. "I'm so sor—"

     She holds up a hand, stopping me. I press my palms against the front of my jeans, wiping away the sweat as I glance down at my letter, fighting the urge to turn the page over because that's more conspicuous than just leaving it.

     Cas's mother steps into the kitchen. She looks exactly the same as I remember her. There aren't even the telltale signs of aging that I would've imagined; her face is smooth, void of any lines that would indicate five years have passed. Her dark hair has been left down, unusual for her, the curls thicker than ever. They remind me of Cas's hair, what it used to be.

     "You look well," she says, smiling. It doesn't seem like she hates me, but then I hadn't really expected the turn of events my reunion with Cas took.

     "Thank you," I blurt. "So do you." I make a sweeping motion towards her. "Are you back at the hospital, too?"

     "Too?" she asks.

     I hesitate for a moment before answering, "I saw Cas there a few days ago."

     "You saw Cas?" She raises a delicate eyebrow.

     I'm halted by her response, by her lack of knowledge on the events that took place. It's not like Cas to not have told her. He's always been close with her. I wonder if this was a snub at me or at her.

     "Yes, he came by here," I respond honestly. "And then I ran into him at the hospital."

     She nods slowly, thoughtfully. Before she can say anything, I go, "I owe you an apology."

     "You don't owe me anything, Dresden," she says and it isn't a slight. She believes that. "I don't presume to understand why things went the way they did between you and Cas. It isn't for me to know. That's between you and him. But you both were young, too young maybe for the capacity of your relationship."

     I don't understand what she means by that because it sounds like she isn't blaming me for ending things with Cas and she certainly should.

     "But," she says, startling me. "You should talk to Cas. If you owe anybody anything, it's him."

     I frown. "I'm not sure he wants to hear from me."

     The expression on her face changes, gets murky. She steps closer, resting a hand on the island between us. "He wasn't very nice, was he?"

     "He wasn't anything that wasn't warranted," I tell her.

     "He's hurting," she says quietly. "I don't know how to help him."

     I frown. "That's on me. I did the hurting."

     She shakes her head. "Not just you. I think he's been bottling this hurt for a long time. Since his father left. And you leaving compounded on that."

     I scrub my face, massaging at the pain in my temple. I move hands away so she can hear me clearly when I say, "I'm going to fix this."

     She smiles weakly but it falls just as quickly as it comes. "You're a good person, Dres. Despite how things ended, I still believe that. You're exactly who a mother would've wanted their son's first love to be."

     "Please stop," I say and the words break because I'm breaking down. She's looking at me openly, seeing me, and it's too much. Not when I know the ways I've destroyed her son. I am so undeserving of her concern it sickens me.

     "What's going on with Cas?" I ask. "Why are you back?"

     Olivia looks up at the ceiling like god's listening. "I don't know. I have no idea. He was fine for years. I mean, I suppose not fine. There were ups and downs his first few years, as you're aware. And I expected some fall out his freshman year but it never came. At least not the way it did his last year of PA school. He nearly flunked out, which left him with practically no residency options. So I pulled some strings to get him a place in the ER here. But then he wasn't even going to take it. It's all so unprecedented. Which is why I think it's more than just you. I mean I know it is. It's you, it's his father, it's his friends. He feels abandoned."

     Because he was, I think. I'd never even considered how my actions would land in the wake of his father's. How Cas must feel like everyone he loves leaves him. 

     "I don't even recognize him anymore," she adds with a heavy sigh. "He's mean, Dres. My Cas. Mean. He was never like that."

     It's hard knowing and seeing the ways I've ruined Cas, but now I know Olivia's been swept up in the fallout, too. I reach over squeezing her hand, trying to comfort her. I don't say it, but I vow then, to bring him back for her.

     She's teary-eyed and blinks them away. "Anyway," she says with a shake of her head. "I think — I hope being home will be good for him. I really didn't come here to unload on you. I actually came to say hello to Dolores. But I'm glad I caught you. Everything's good with you?" she asks. "You're okay?"

     I squeeze her hand again. "Don't worry about me. I'm okay." I hold her gaze as I say, sincerely, "I really am going to fix this."

    "There's nothing for you to fix, Dres," she responds. "Cas is an adult. And he's responsible for what he does or how he behaves now. I know he'll figure things out. I just hate watching him do it. It makes me feel helpless."

      "I thought," I say and then stop. "I thought that I could hurt him if it was for his own good. And I did, I really believed it was for his own good."

     I don't realize I'm crying until Olivia steps around the island, closing the space between us with open arms, hugging me so deeply that it feels like a warped sequence of present and past. "There are some mistakes," she says softly. "That break us in half. Separate our parts so we can never be whole again. This isn't that. You both will heal from this. That I believe."

     We stay like that long enough for me to almost believe it, too.

      As Olivia's walking out, Tasha steps into the kitchen. "Morning," she says as she passes.

     Tasha cocks her head to the side like she's a cartoon character. Once Olivia's out of sight she says, "I thought we didn't let anyone back here."

     "We don't," I say giving her a look. I feel raw and exposed, have to put up mental defenses to get some semblance of control back.

     "Why are you looking at me like I'm not allowed back here? I'm here to help. Look I'm even early. Be amazed by me," she says.

     "This is me amazed," I deadpan as I gather the letter I was writing and slip it inside its envelope.

     "Are you ever going to tell me who you're writing to? A foreign pen pal? A long lost lover? Military brethren?"

     "All of the above."

     Tasha smirks. "It's the long lost lover. It's always the long lost lover."

     "I thought you were here to help," I say.

    Her smirk turns into a big grin, all teeth. "Put me to work, boss."

     I point to the bowls of icing already prepared, waiting on the counter near the doorway. "You can start filling piping bags."

     Tasha nods. "So who was that?"

     "Old friend," I respond dismissively as I check the ovens. The first batters aren't cooked yet so I get set on mixing the next ones I'll need.

     "Old girlfriend?"

     "I think you know the answer to that," I say.

     "It's 2019, you could swing for both teams."

     "I don't."

     "It's 2019, you could tell me something about your love life."

     "That doesn't even make sense."

     "A girl had to try."

     By the time Charles comes in, Tasha and I have finished the first batches and filled the displays. Tasha's back out front and I'm starting the prep for the afternoon's batches. My favorite thing about Charles is that I don't need to say anything; he finds his place in the kitchen and picks up exactly where I need him to.

     But today I have to break our routine.

     "How important is it to you that someone apologizes when they've done something wrong?" I ask him.

     Charles startles, lifting his head from the piping bag he was using on the Lemony Snicker cupcakes — a lemon cake base infused with a caramel center, a chocolate fudge icing and peanut crumb topping.

     He gives me his undivided attention, setting down the bag. "It depends, I suppose," he responds slowly. "I think what I've learned is that changed behavior is more important than words."

     I furrow my brow. "Changed behavior how exactly?"

     Charles says, "Let's say anytime I ask you to do something, you forget and don't do it. I ask you to pick up my prescriptions on your way home, or to feed the dogs, or buy bread when you're at the store. And you apologize to me but then forget the next time. The apology doesn't mean much if the behavior doesn't change. I'd rather someone didn't apologize and just didn't do that thing again."

     I nod, thoughtfully. "I see. So for you the apology itself doesn't carry much weight."

     "I've noticed in my age that apologizing has become reflexive. You make a comment, I say that was mean, and you immediately apologize. No thought about it, no questions asked. You don't even really know what you're apologizing for. If you don't why you're sorry, how can you really be sorry? What's to keep you from doing that thing again?"

     He's giving me a lot to think about, too wise of advice to accompany everything else going on in my head. I'm overwhelmed.

     Charles laughs like he can see as much and claps me on the back, just the once. "Show him, don't tell him you're sorry."

     It doesn't particularly surprise me Charles knows I'm talking about Cas. I imagine Dolores told him everything or he might have asked when he noticed the Cold War between us had thawed. I give Charles credit for managing to stay Switzerland during the whole thing, especially since he quite liked Cas. But then, everyone does.

     Dres,                                                                                                                   07/22/16

     Last night I dreamt of you.

     If we're being honest here, I dream about you a lot of nights. This wasn't really like the others, though, because this was more of a memory. If my brains gonna' to start pulling memories, you'd think it would exercise some selectivity. We've got good memories, the kind that throat punch, the kind of memories I'd sell my soul to pull out of my brain Dumbledore-style and store in a basin, never to fade, never to change.

     All that time with you, I remember thinking, thinking so much and so often, hoping really, that we'd never change. And then you did. Without warning.

     Anyway, the memory in question was a day at the lake. Super uneventful. Not even one of the days where Jack and his wife had joined us. It was just you and me. I think it rained this day but it wasn't raining in my dream. We were hanging by the buoy in the deep section you could dive in. The lake was pretty much empty. And I was whining about my legs getting tired. And you said, "Come here." So I did and I latched onto you but then I was like, "What happens when you get tired?"

     "You let go," you'd said and your tone was kinda serious? But I hadn't really caught onto it.

     "What?" I laughed. "Why?"

     And you said, "So I don't drag you down with me." I maybe should've paid better attention to that at the time. But I'm thinking about it now. Thinking maybe you thought you'd take me down with you. I don't know. Maybe that's a reach. I've been trying to put together why things went they did with us. I feel like a scientist constantly testing hypothesis here.

     Anyway, do you remember that night in bed, the morning actually, when you were like "dOn'T sLeEp wItH OtHer pEopLE wIThOut ProTecTiON" well fuck you very much for saying that. I never told you but that shit hurt. And FYI I'm not sleeping with anybody. There's nobody I want to sleep with but you. And also, just so we're clear, you were never the fucking anchor, you were my life jacket.

     So yeah fuck you.

     (But like obviously NOT fuck you) (unless the fuck you incentivizes you to write back in which case fuck fuck fuckity you Dres)

     That dream sucked. And I miss you, is all.

     Always,

     Cas