fic, Supernatural: And It Breaks My Heart To See You This Way (Dean/Castiel), NC17
God, I never spoiler-warned a fic so much.
Title: And It Breaks My Heart To See You This Way
Pairing: Dean/Castiel even if it's actually Past!Dean/Future!Cas
Rating: NC17, baby
Word count: 9936
Spoilers: heavy for 5x04.
Summary: Dean knows he’s trying to pick up some pieces that are so broken he won’t ever be able to put them back together, not even for a short while, but still. He owes Cas a try, at least.
A/N: so. I owed lasamy birthday fic and she told me to get inspired by 5x04 and go wild with it, which is exactly what I did. I hope you like it ♥ ♥ ♥ and if you don't I'll write you that crack anyway. ;) Apart from that, title is stolen from a Flogging Molly song which imo fits for the pairing but that's all the relation it has with this. Also using for 2x5obsessions #5, all that is left.
“That’s how I roll,” Cas says before letting out another of those laughs which Dean has started to think of as hateful the first second he heard one; Dean just takes a breath and looks out of the window because he just can’t bear to even glance at his left. This is so wrong on so many fucking levels that he doesn’t even know where to begin to count them, and the fact that it’s the end of days doesn’t justify it. Fine, it might justify people hardening, or taking drastic decisions, or trying to forget what’s going on, but not to this degree. It doesn’t justify Cas being this wreck and it doesn’t justify his own fucking attitude.
He thinks his head is stuck on the torturing.
Christ, if he really started doing it again (and he has this idea that no one was pulling some sick joke on him; actually, it seemed that Cas was pretty intent on making him get what was at stake exactly and he can only imagine why), it means that he just gave up on whatever fucking humanity he had left somewhere along the line and Dean just wants to throw up at the idea. Since Cas pulled him out, priority number two after dealing with the major fuckery going on in his life was trying not to let Hell get to him again, and he has always known he was walking a fine line (let’s just not think about that time when someone asked that of him); this looks just like Hell got to him again fucking alright, which means that he doesn’t give a shit anymore, and if he doesn’t give a shit anymore it means that he’s practically back there in his head, at least, and Dean wants to throw up (again) for the hundredth time since he ended up back to the future. He kills the instinct though; he figures that they really can’t use it right now.
He dares glancing at Cas again; he’s looking at the road ahead with slightly unfocused eyes, but Dean has to admit that his driving is pretty competent. He isn’t catching any more holes than necessary, his hands are a perfect ten-and-two on the steering wheel, he has complete control of the car (it’s not like Dean can’t recognize when someone is a competent driver or not); pretty remarkable, for someone driving while popping fucking amphetamines dry.
“Who taught you?”
“Who taught me what?”
“To drive. I figure you didn’t learn on your own.”
Cas shakes his head for a brief second and keeps on looking ahead.
“Nope. It should’ve been you and it was Chuck.”
“What?”
“It was after it was clear I wasn’t going to use alternative means of transport again. But I’d really like it if we could drop it here.”
“Why?”
“It’s not what I want to think about while I actually drive,” Cas answers before taking out of his pocket the damned bottle again. He swallows another pill dry. Shit. Dean brings a hand to his forehead and tries to remember the program. Someone had told him they were going to reach the fucking place about three hours before dawn and they could use that time to catch some sleep in the cars. Right. Fine. He’s going to corner Cas then. Dean needs answers, a lot of fucking answers, and after all Castiel seems like the one person around who will provide them; or at least, he’s the only one who has answered straight at him until now anyway, and the fact that now he does answer straight after all is pretty much the only improvement he can witness in this reality, at least concerning Cas. His future self sure as fuck doesn’t count, not when it took two conversations and a good bunch of lies to find out about Sam.
Sam.
Shit.
The first thing Dean is doing when he gets his ass back to the right time is calling him. He tries not to think about what he said before Zachariah decided to pull this awesome joke on him. He can’t afford that now.
Also, the second thing he’s doing is keeping an eye on Cas and make sure he never comes near a fucking damned cigarette on his watch, or ever. Or near anything remotely addictive, and patience it if his plans to make Cas try coffee will remain plans.
--
It’s an hour or so before Cas pulls over and turns the engine off; Dean’s future self storms out of his own car and passes in front of theirs, saying they should get some sleep while they can, and then turns away.
Dick, Dean thinks again, and at this point he made peace with the fact that he’s insulting himself.
He’s about to ask Cas again when he sees him reaching for a bag on the backseat; he searches for something inside and when he’s done, in his hand there are a joint and a lighter. Dean doesn’t even try to discourage him; a minute later, there’s a sharp smell of weed filling up the car and Dean thinks he might want to throw up. Again. Cas looks more relaxed, though; Dean isn’t too surprised. Weed is known for that too, anyway.
“So.”
“So what?”
“You aren’t driving anymore.”
“Well, yeah, I definitely am not.”
“Then tell me.”
“Long story, Dean.”
“We have another three hours at least. And Cas, while I did completely get how you roll and I have an idea about how the other me here rolls, I don’t roll that way. And you should know it. Would you just tell me? If driving is a sore subject, fine. Just tell me what the fuck happened.”
“Don’t you think that I might not want to talk about it?” comes the answer, the words slightly slurred, and of course Cas is smiling as he talks, that empty stoned smile which Dean would very much like to wipe off his face. It just sounds like Cas doesn’t give a damn anymore, and well, fine, he probably doesn’t; that’s exactly why Dean needs to know. He needs to make fucking sure that whatever went on, this doesn’t happen again. If Cas doesn’t want to cooperate, he’ll make him.
He takes a breath before getting out of the car and slamming the door; he gets on the driver’s side, opens Cas’s door, takes his arm and drags him out. He feels physical pain as he slams Cas’s free wrist against the car; the other winces slightly and Dean feels guilty because sure as hell this Cas doesn’t need any kind of unnecessary hurt at this point, but if it does pay off then he won’t ever be like this. Not on Dean’s watch anyway.
“Cas, please. I know you think that even if I try to change things we’ll end up here, but I can’t stand this. I can’t stand seeing you like this. I can’t stand seeing myself, dammit. I need to know. And if you don’t want to tell me the whole story at least just tell me what happened to you. Don’t say life. Just don’t, okay?”
Cas looks up at him for one second, seeming slightly more focused than before; then he shrugs and takes another smoke from the joint still between his shaking fingers.
“Tell you. Right. And why would you be so interested?”
“What the fuck of a question is that?”
“Well, you stopped giving a damn after one point, and you were here to see it.”
“I’m not him. And sorry but I give a damn. Maybe more than one.”
For a second something in Cas’s features softens and Dean can see something behind hazy, unfocused blue eyes which resembles fondness too much to mistake it for anything else, before he takes another drag and looks the other way.
“I know you do. You do. Believe me, I know. Fine. Fine, you know what? You asked for it, you’ll get it. You want to know just about the decadent part of it or you want the whole picture?”
“Whole picture.”
“Fine, whole picture it is. It sort of started after Detroit. For the both of us, more or less. Detroit was two years ago. I still was what I was. You still were who you were. Right, maybe you were hardened, some, but... anyway. You decided I needed to fucking learn to drive, and you were actually going to let me even use your car, but I always refused. Said I didn’t need it. Guess what? Detroit happens and one day or two after I realize I need to eat and sleep and all the fun that comes with being human, I also realize I need to shave. And I cut myself while I do shave. And the wound doesn’t heal. Clearly, I really need to learn to drive at this point, but no one was actually thinking about that. Know why?”
“Why?” Dean asks, sure that he doesn’t want to know it. Cas takes another drag, a nervous one, even thought it’s very deep. Dean thinks he will never be able to smell weed in his whole life without throwing up.
“Because, me and you. Back then. Let’s put it like this. Chuck always said we were an item.”
Cas pauses and Dean just looks at him. He doesn’t even blink. He can’t afford to blink. Also, considering his future self’s and Cas’s exchanges, he had sort of understood that there was something between that which wasn’t just lost friendship. And Dean will admit that he has thought about his Cas that way, lately. He just never dared acting on it. He can sort of believe he would at some point, though, so... yeah. Fine. Not exactly a surprise.
“What? Not freaking out?”
“I doubt that’s what freaks me out most here. So?”
“Better. So. Detroit, you know? You weren’t exactly in the mood for talking. Or for consoling me over my losses. Or for teaching me how to drive. Or for anything which wasn’t either staying closed in your room without letting anyone in or storm out of the camp and kill some zombies. I tried. I really did. You just didn’t listen. But that wasn’t really the point where it all went to hell. That was a couple of months later.”
“What happened?”
Cas takes another breath and looks almost worried when he realizes that he has maybe just another couple of hits before the joint goes off. He shrugs and takes his second-to-last one.
“First of all, you left the car there. You saw how it is. It ended with Chuck teaching me how to drive on some crappy thing that we had around in the camp.”
“Chuck?”
“Yeah. Chuck. So? Just, anyway. Two months later, Bobby went back to South Dakota in order to get some stuff from his house. Someone from camp went with him.”
“And...?”
“Demons. They ambushed them and killed them all. That was when you really, really, really started to lose it. Took you three months to find them, it probably would’ve took you less if the Croatoan hadn’t started spreading at that time, and then you wanted answers.”
“You aren’t telling me that...”
Cas’s eyes are so empty as he takes a last drag and looks up at him that Dean feels genuinely frightened. He lets Cas’s wrist go and lets out a breath of relief when Cas doesn’t move.
“I tried to talk you out of it. Told you all kinds of shit. That I dragged a man out of Hell for some reason and that you hated it when you tortured someone the first and last time you did it after I brought you out. That this was going to kill you, or at least the you I cared about. The you for whom I did all this and for whom I’d have given my fucking life. The you for whom I stayed and lost every damned thing. I think I begged you or some crap like that, even. You know what?”
“I went in anyway.”
“Yeah. You just said that you were sad to prove me wrong first. When you got out of there... boy, if you thought I didn’t like what came out of that other room back then, you don’t know how much I didn’t like round two.”
Silence suddenly falls and Dean can’t bring himself to raise his hand to stop Castiel when he fishes some other bottle out of his pocket and swallows dry a couple of pills. Xanax, he reads on the label. Jesus Christ. Maybe, he figures, Cas needs this shit in order to go on with the talking, at this point. He hopes it’s just because of that and he starts feeling guilty because he did ask first, but he doubts that it does much harm. Considering where they are, or Cas is, or whatever.
“Next thing I know, you just don’t give a crap. Other next thing I know, I can’t deal with anything because I’m fucking human and I just don’t know how to start dealing with it and Chuck is the only one who will give a damn. Sadly, it isn’t enough. Though don’t think I didn’t appreciate it. Especially when he came with some beer he stole from the supplies. That was nice. Other next thing I know, you start being even more reckless than usual. Final next thing I know, we’re on a mission, I fuck my balance up because I’m still not used to needing to run, my foot is broken and I don’t get eaten by some zombie just because someone near me shoots them all and manages to get me into some car.”
Castiel takes another breath and looks at his feet. Dean doesn’t dare moving. He feels sick. He can sort of see where this is all heading.
“So, I’m in pain. A whole damn lot of pain. You drop by sometimes, but you don’t say shit. And I’m stuck there. We had this doctor, back then. Good guy. Died in a mission some time ago. Anyway, we had some morphine and I was in so much pain because I just wasn’t used to it that he decided to give me some. It worked. Then it was other painkillers. Then I couldn’t fucking sleep because they were messing up my system and there came the sleeping pills. And I couldn’t exactly cope with it and there wasn’t no one around who realized what was good for former angels or not and then I just couldn’t stay without. Then after one month when I was managing to get up and move around this girl gets into my cabin.”
“And?”
“And she blows me. Right on the bed. She was high, but I didn’t even try to push her away. She was someone. Just, someone and she was there. And she had the absinthe. From there... well. You don’t even want to know what exactly I tried. But I just couldn’t give a damn. It made me feel good or at least momentarily forget where I was and why I was there and what were you doing a couple of cabins down the road. Took you six months to find out.”
“And what did I...”
“Pathetic son of a bitch, if I remember right.”
Cas's voice drops to a whisper and Dean thinks he does indeed remember right.
“That was it. I think it was the first time I called you fearless leader, too, by the way. Whatever. The girl brought a friend, she brought another friend and I figured I’d fully embrace decadence for what it was. Better than fucking deal with reality, right?”
“Did I... did he...”
Cas’s laugh is bitter. “He doesn’t care. You don’t. Not anymore, at least. But I get it. I really do. There was a point when you’d just break. I figured I just hoped I could avoid you ever getting there, but... looks like you just brought me with you. But it’s fine. Really. It is. It went like this, it’s done, done, and just... that’s it. Satisfied, now?”
His voice is verging on hysterical and the last two sentences’ words had tumbled over each other, not exactly slurring but giving plenty of evidence of Cas’s current state; Dean is still frozen, unable to act on anything, wishing that this was all some nightmare (and maybe it is, except that this can become reality and he really needs to avoid it at all costs) and that he didn’t have to see this. But he has to and he is, and that’s when his hand starts moving without his brain’s consent and fingers close softly around Cas’ wrist as he obviously reaches for the Xanax again. If he sees him swallowing some of that crap dry again Dean will probably throw up here and now, dammit. He sees that Cas’s frame is shaking all over and that he isn’t doing anything to get free of his very, very loose hold; something forms a lump in Dean’s throat as his other hand reaches Cas’s chin and slowly, gently turns his face up so that he can look at him.
He meets eyes which were always too big for their own good but that look just enormous now; they’re slightly more focused now, but still hazy and there are some tears threatening to fall from the corners and Cas turns his head again shaking it just merely five seconds after.
“Cas, what...”
“Fuck. Fuckfuckfuck.”
“What?”
“Just... you used... you used to look at me like that. Before. I thought I had forgotten that. Woah. Fantastic. That’s just fucking fantastic.”
His body tenses and he looks like he’s ready to bolt and go off and get... fucking lost or killed or whatever and Dean just knows that he can’t stand this. The wreck in front of him might be everything his Cas never was (and God forbid, Dean would rather have him a clueless, angelic virgin any second than this) but point is that it doesn’t matter; it takes looking at him straight in the face again for Dean to see that this is Cas alright. Beyond fucked, sure, and without wings and the stick up his ass (oh, how he misses it now), but it’s still Cas, and if Dean thinks that he gave up everything for Dean to end up like this with this jerk of a future him who is everything Dean always swore to himself he’d never become, not after Hell especially, well, his stomach turns and the knot that forms there is huge and it might just be three hours until dawn, but if there’s the slight chance that Dean can fix at least some of this... fuck it, he will.
It doesn’t even freak him out that whatever is going through Cas’ mind at this point is probably memories of them being an item. Fine. He already admitted it, he has been having that kind of thoughts about his Cas for a while. And now, when he gets back home, he might even start acting on them before he had planned because fuck it, if this Cas is in love wih him then his Cas won’t say fuck you and disappear in a beat of wings. So, well, it’s wrong if he does anything now, but not so much maybe, and considering that his future him is not around tonight, he’ll stop worrying about him. Dean’s hand gets back on Cas’s neck and he’s as gentle as he can while he brushes the exposed skin there. Cas is still shaking and still looks at him like he’s going to disappear any second, back to his time where he belongs anyway maybe, and Dean knows it isn’t a problem. Not for now, at least.
“Cas.”
“I... God, I just... It’s been years, fuck...”
Dean doesn’t have time to freak out over the fact that he’s not freaking out at the amount of swearing coming out of Castiel’s mouth.
“Cas. Can’t we... get in the back?”
“The back...?”
“It’s... chilly. Out here, I mean.”
It really isn’t, not too much at least, but Dean can’t do this out in the open. Or better, he can, but he doesn’t want his fearless leader persona to catch them by chance or something. This mess is all his fault, or their fault or whatever, and Dean wants whatever happens now to be intimate, just a thing between the two of them, no one else in the picture. The orgies aren’t the point; this Cas doesn’t agree with intimate much anymore, he thinks, and it’s just so wrong. For a second he starts to think about the things he will do to his Cas when he’s back, or the things he will say, but then he pushes the thought out of his head. This is here and now and thinking about trench coats, half smiles and head tilts and conversations about personal space isn’t really his wisest idea. Cas nods though, his still shaking hand opens the back door of the car and he climbs in. Dean follows and shuts it close.
“Dean, what...”
“Shut up,” he mutters before placing a hand around Cas’ shoulder and one around his waist; Cas is suddenly still as Dean draws him slowly against Dean’s chest until his cheek rests over dark hair. It doesn’t last long. Five seconds after he stops, just when he was wondering whether this wasn’t a terrible idea, shaking hands clutch his jacket behind his shoulder and Cas moves harshly until he’s practically in Dean’s lap, his frame trembling all over and his face buried in the hollow of Dean’s neck. Dean wishes he could distinguish how much of the shaking is drugs and how much isn’t, but maybe it isn’t even important. He takes a second to notice that Cas’s legs are draped in a quite weird angle before closing any space that was left between them. He keeps an arm around the former angel’s waist while his other hand rubs random circles all over Cas’s back (and doesn’t that shirt feel so wrong) and he has to bite his lip in order not to gasp when he realizes that Cas is actually pressing back against his hand wherever it roams.
Jesus, he thinks, this is so fucked up. I am so fucked up, he adds then, because he thinks that a good chunk of fault here lies with his fearless leader persona who apparently sees it fit not to give a shit anymore. And he has thought, at times, that he hated himself. Right. Sure. Never as much as right now, that’s a given.
He takes a breath and without moving his hands from where they are he manages to turn around and maneuver the both of them so that he’s lying on the backseat with Cas on top of him; he hears a content sigh coming from somewhere near his shoulder when they’re settled, maybe the first not completely depressing sound he has heard coming out of this Cas’ mouth since he got into his cabin, and so he just keeps on rubbing those circles. At one point his hand starts raising up on its own accord and there’s something that makes him want to cry in the way Cas turns his head against Dean’s hand when his fingers get tangled in black hair which is way cleaner than Dean would have figured, especially if the personal hygiene goods aren’t hot stuff around camp. It’s like Cas is fucking starved for this and maybe he is, orgies or not orgies, and before Dean can ask he gets an answer.
“It’s been so much time,” Cas murmurs against his skin, and Dean barely hears it since it’s muffled and Cas’s voice is impossibly low.
“So much time since what?” he answers, keeping his voice low as his nails lightly scrape skin on Cas’s nape.
“Since this meant something. Since you,” Cas definitely slurs, and Dean has an idea that if he wasn’t high on whatever shit he’s high now he probably wouldn’t have said this. Or maybe he would have. After all, at least since he died for him, Cas really never has been one that keeps things for himself. Nice contrast, Dean thinks, considering that if there was some contest for keeping stuff to one’s self Dean would probably win that hands down. Look where this is going to bring him.
“So you really do like past me, or me, or whatever?” Dean asks, trying to keep his voice from breaking, because there’s something about this whole situation that makes him ache. Dean knows he’s trying to pick up some pieces that are so broken he won’t ever be able to put them back together, not even for a short while, but still. He owes Cas a try, at least.
Cas raises his head slightly and if Dean’s shirt feels slightly damp, Dean doesn’t care. Cas is still not exactly looking at him, more at the battered leather of the backseat, but his arms are still tight around Dean’s neck and he figures it’s enough. For now.
“If you only knew how much I missed you. You know. The first times... it felt good because... I kind of saw you. I mean, I knew it wasn’t real, but still, it was better than... you know. Then after a while I didn’t anymore. Guess it was because I was adjusted. Oh. Could... you do that again?”
Cas’s voice trails at the last question and Dean tries to understand what he means, except that right, he has just stopped beating around the bush and instead of scraping here and there he has fucking honest to god carded his fingers through Cas’s hair. He does it again, Cas nuzzles closer and Dean decides that he isn’t stopping until his fingers can’t take it anymore.
“Mm, yes. Feels so nice. Like it used to. Sorry, I shouldn’t be saying that. To you of anyone. ‘S not your fault, really. Just, try to stay like this, alright?”
Too much is the only sequence of words running through Dean’s head. When he answers, his voice is choked. He can’t do anything for it.
“Cas, I just... I swear that...”
“Don’t. Don’t. Don’t swear or promise me anything. You never know.” Cas suddenly looks at him and Dean has to look back. God, those eyes, he just can’t tear his stare away, not when even if Cas is still shaking they’re a lot more focused now than before. There are small wrinkles on the corners which weren’t there before, not in Dean’s time anyway, and they are the eyes of someone who wants to believe something but can’t bring himself to. Christ. “You never know what’s gonna happen.”
“It doesn’t have to be like this. Fuck, I can’t see you like this, I can’t see myself like that, and maybe he doesn’t care but...”
“Oh, Dean. He did. Don’t think he didn’t. He did care, or... you did, whatever. It wasn’t always this way. Don’t promise when you don’t know if you can maintain it.”
“It doesn’t have to be this way.”
“I wish I could say I believe you. Fuck, there was a time when I would have without even thinking about it. I actually think it still was like that... when you come from, I mean.”
Dean swallows and when he realizes that Cas started shaking harder pulls Cas’s head down against his shoulder again, resuming his hair-carding business; shit, if Cas is telling the truth, and no reason to think he isn’t, then in his time... damn. He needs to get into Cas’s head (his Cas, of course) that whatever crap Dean says isn’t always the right thing. When he’s back. But now he isn’t and he’ll worry about it another time. Yeah, another time. Right.
“Dean?”
”Yeah?”
“Could you... do me a favor?”
Dean takes a breath. “Anything you wish,” he answers, and he isn’t really surprised when Cas tenses for a second. Yeah, so what. He didn’t choose his wording at random.
“Tell me about him. Me. Well. You got that.”
“What? You want me to talk to you about yourself?”
“As I was. As I am in your year or whatever it is.”
Dean isn’t sure this is a good idea. Actually, he’s sure it’s a very, very bad idea. Still. He said anything you wish.
“Okay. Fine. Uhm. You’re most definitely still an angel, even if thanks to your awesome act of free will you’re kind of less of one than you were before. Technically, because, er, well, let’s say that in practice I think that your points on the angelic chart got way higher. You know. Talking actions and such. As far as I know, you’re still a virgin. Actually if now... er, past you knew about the orgies and stuff he’d probably hyperventilate at best. Or if you mentioned women at all, I think. Even if you aren’t too adverse to alcohol. Or beer, at least. You don’t get three quarters of the shit I say but... well, I kind of like that. I mean, it just wouldn’t be you if you weren’t that clueless anyway. Your sense of fashion still sucks but I have to say I kind of like the coat. You still have that damned faith both in your father and in yours truly aka myself which sometimes frankly scares me, but I kind of...”
Wouldn’t want you any other way is what he was about to say, but Dean stops himself before he does. Fuck this shit, he doesn’t want to say anything that could imply making explicit comparisons.
“... I kind of like it. I don’t have much, but you probably have enough for the both of us. I just... well, now this sounds pathetic and if I told past you, he’d probably tilt his head that way and think that something must be possessing me because I really never said such a thing in front of him or stuff, but... shit, took me thirty years and the weirdest shit happening, but you’re pretty much the fucking first and only friend I’ve had until now and... I... Cas?”
The shaking got worse. Wonderful. He just knew. He just hopes it’s because of too much shit kicking in.
“Sorry. I just... I just wanted... you know. These days you’re stuck on useless or pathetic or the sort. Except... I thought it’d feel good, and it did, but still...”
Dean would seriously want to punch both Cas and himself (the future one, of course) because while Cas seemingly likes to leave sentences hanging open, he understood this indeed. And if Cas needs him to say some nice things about his past self because current Dean won’t tell him anything even remotely nice...
Well, fuck this shit. Dean might not exactly be the greatest optimist that ever lived, but he has his share of practice in the art of finding something positive among a fuck hell of a lot of negative, even if it doesn’t exactly always work. He hopes it does this time. He sits up so that his back is almost completely lying against the door of the car (thankfully it isn’t narrow) and takes Cas by the shoulders so that they’re facing each other.
“Now. You listen to me, alright? I don’t think you need to hear from me how awesome you were back then and compare it with how much you fucking suck now.”
“Isn’t that the truth?” Cas answers, still that fixed, insufferable, empty smile on his face, and Dean just wants it to stop. “At least I wasn’t useless back then. You have much nicer things to say about this now? Sorry for that, but life happens. As I said. I appreciate that...”
“You damned... screw it, you aren’t useless. And if future me can’t see it, screw him too. If he doesn’t, then I really swear to myself I won’t ever let it get bad.”
“What is that he can’t see?” Cas asks, his voice suddenly lower, barely a whisper and strangely unsure, and he sounds a lot less under the influence now.
“Shit, Cas, you’re still here.”
“What...?”
“I told you before, right? I mean, it took me thirty years before I could call someone a friend. Now, you know, friends are usually supposed to stick. Not too hard to get, right? And... you did everything you did and lost everything and you didn’t leave the second time he, I, whatever, pulled up some serious shit, and you just stuck when as far as I know you’re the first person who has really done this for me. If I, if he became such a son of a bitch that he doesn’t see or appreciate it, well, screw him. Or us. I fucking do and even if it’s probably too late, since I’m sure he never said it... thank you. And, also on his behalf even if he probably doesn’t know it anyway, sorry for not keeping up my end. And I’m not saying this because I’m humoring you. I mean it.”
Things happen fast, after that.
One second, he hears a soft, choked but someway relieved sob escaping from Cas’s throat; the other second, Cas’s face is inches from his own, lips so close they could kiss if one of them moved, eyes which are looking at him with such gratefulness that it twists Dean’s insides and yeah, fuck, who cares about the consequences. Dean nods because he doesn’t want to risk reading things wrong and anyway, a nod always works anyway, and whatever Cas wants to do Dean isn’t going to deny; then lips are covering his, just a bare touch even if they don’t move. Of course, indeed, and Dean presses back a bit, just a bit, enough to make Cas understand that he’s okay with this, more than okay with this even if he’d have never thought that this would be his first kiss with Cas. Even though it technically might not be, if future him and Cas... whatever. He won’t get an headache over that. Then Cas’s hands are cradling his face, the skin way less soft and way more calloused than Dean remembers, but there’s such carefulness in the gesture, like Cas actually wants to savor it, that he really doesn’t mind; the kiss becomes a lot less chaste and JesusChristalmighty runs through Dean’s head as Cas’s tongue maps every inch it touches. Cas kisses him thoroughly, like he can’t get enough, and with such skill that Dean can’t help feel amazed for one second before he realizes that yeah, orgies anyone? One will learn how to kiss if that’s his hobby, right? He brings a hand behind Cas’s neck again and the other to his hair and he feels Cas sighing in pleasure when he does; there’s something hard pressing against Dean’s thigh and well, fuck, if Cas can get this hard even if he’s on every possible kind of influence it does mean something, Dean figures.
Not that it’s important. He lets Cas take control but tries to keeps things slow. He wants this to be good. He wants this to be fucking good as much as he had hoped for Cas’ first time to be fucking good back then, and now he won’t dare asking if it had been with him (Dean is honest enough to admit, now, that the whorehouse had happened because at the time he hadn’t realized that Cas might have been interested in him and not in women, otherwise, well...) and how was it. Right now it doesn’t matter. Cas might be the wreck that’s in front of Dean, but it’s still Cas and he deserves it to be fucking good.
He doesn’t know how much the kiss lasts. He knows it’s a while and he knows it was good, even if there’s something about the way he could taste the weed on Cas’s tongue which was totally and utterly wrong, but after a while it got easier not to notice. Cas’s forehead rests against his while they breathe, and it’s almost synchronized, look at that; Cas’s hands are still there, cradling his face like he’s fucking surprised that Dean is there and that he can touch him. Talk about fucked up, but that’s established anyway.
“Oh, I missed you so much,” Cas says, his voice breaking on the last word, and Dean just brings his head down and kisses him again, and not the way he has kissed countless random hook-ups but the way he kissed Cassie when they were a serious thing and he had decided to tell her, the way that he hopes screams that this isn’t out of pity but just out of the fact that Dean wants it. And he does. He does want it as much as he wants Cas as he is in 2009, but this really doesn’t change shit. It’s the same person; changed, yeah, but still the same and he wants this Cas too. If he just managed to make Cas get it, but he’ll work on that.
It’s easy to ignore the taste of weed after a while, when you’re kissed like it’s a matter of life and death, and maybe it is; there’s a point when he doesn’t feel it anymore, or maybe he’s just adjusted. As they kiss, though, Dean moves his hands and takes care to let them trail at random, touching Cas everywhere they can reach; one moves under his shirt and as Dean feels Cas’s hips under his fingertips, he thinks that he’s really way too thin. Chuck would probably say that food is scarce. Dean can believe that.
Cas arches under the touch and Dean swallows moans into the still ongoing kiss; Dean doesn’t break it and instead pushes both of his hands under the shirt. It’s Cas that breaks the kiss next, and quite abruptly for that matter. He gets rid of his shirt and while he does Dean tries to sit up and gets rid of his jacket and shirt, letting them fall on the floor of the car next to that hippie thing that Cas was wearing; for a second they just stare at each other. Cas is obviously checking every single inch of him out, not that Dean minds, and Dean almost gasps in shock when he sees that Cas does have a few scars of his own. Strange. He has always imagined Cas as... well, completely scar-less. For someone who heals magically, how can you do otherwise? Now he doesn’t anymore, though. Right?
He reaches out slowly; he lets a finger trace a white straight line on Cas’s hip, so faded that it’s almost invisible, he ignores a faint red hickey on his shoulder, he kisses a not-so-red messy scar in the crook of his elbow imagining too easily why is it there and that finally does it.
One second his lips are tracing scarred skin, the other second Cas’ hands are on his wrists and he’s pinning one against the window of the car and the other one against the backseat; their frames are touching and Cas is looking at him with such an intense stare that Dean shivers for a second, and then he realizes that finally Cas took the fucking initiative and he sends a half-grin in his direction. That’s how he needs this to go; he has this idea that this version of Cas has never fucking taken anything which isn’t what meaningless sex can give you in ages and now he needs Cas to take. Dean knows how to give, anyway, even if it seems like he has forgotten it in the last five years.
He rubs his thigh against Cas’s then, and it’s not a surprise when hands reach the waist of his jeans and start pulling them down; Dean really wishes they weren’t in a car, but well. It’s not like he hasn’t had the experience already, and at least, as established before, the car isn’t narrow. They manage to get rid of both of their jeans and underwear before Cas is all over him again, naked skin on naked skin, strangely warm and, Dean thinks, definitely lacking a stick up his ass. He’s somewhat more loose-limbed than Dean would have thought, but it doesn’t matter. Actually, as soon as he feel Cas’s hard-on pressed against his thigh Dean loses a good chunk of coherency because fuck, now Cas is rubbing slowly, so very slowly against him and oh, shit, Dean knows he has just basically whimpered but the rhythm is something excruciating and fuck, who knew that Cas could be such a tease?
Well. Considering how once he helped him in front of a vending machine maybe yeah, there were the seeds in there showing that Cas could indeed become such a tease, but still. Fuck. He looks up and he thinks his heartbeat's speed gets a lot up when he sees a sort of wicked grin on Cas’s face, and it’s not drugs. Or maybe something is, after all the crap Cas had while they were talking he wouldn’t be surprised, but this is almost all sober and therefore almost all Cas and he’s just so goddamn glad to see it that he has to raise his head a bit and kiss Cas right there and then. Yes, he thinks as the kiss goes on and Cas is still doing that hellish thing on Dean's thigh even if he did speed up a bit, thank you so very much, that’s it. Still fucked up like like a few things in his life, and it surely makes the top three, but at least it’s as right as it gets and Cas looks at least slightly more like himself. Though well, the way his tongue is currently tracing Dean’s nipple after the kiss ended is definitely not a his-Cas thing to do, but he likes to imagine that one day it could happen under less fucked up circumstances. Maybe.
Doesn’t matter though; he arches up as he feels his nipple hardening and damn, the fact that Cas is working on the right one with his tongue and the left one with his hand is making Dean want to come right this fucking moment but that just would not do. He closes his eyes and just lets himself feel it, at least until the contact is gone and Dean wants to curse, but he manages to refrain himself and opens his eyes again. Cas is still sprawled on top of him, still pressing slowly against his thigh, his cheeks are slightly flushed and sure as fuck he looks way healthier than he has looked in the last two days or whatever. He looks like he’s about to ask him a question but something keeps him from it and Dean fights the urge to roll his eyes.
“Spit it out. Whatever’s on your mind, just spit it out. I said anything, right?”
”Nah. Let it go. It’s nothing, let’s just...”
“Cas. Tell me. Whatever kinky shit is passing through your head, I won’t bolt out of this car. Not that it’d be a wise idea anyway. If I’m not on board with that I’ll just say no and it’ll be that.”
A hand suddenly touches his cock and Dean gasps once, then fingers get under the head scraping lightly; Cas’ head retreats down and when fingers are replaced with tongue Dean realizes he can’t just stop the flow of obscenities leaving his mouth. Which, well, seems like Cas likes it since his tongue flicks there another couple of times before he stops and his face is inches away from Dean’s.
“You liked that?”
“Does it seem to you like I didn’t?”
“Yeah. Right. Not really. Well, I was cheating. I knew you’d like it. From when we were an item, you know. Anyway, we never... did it like this,” he says gesturing between him and Dean. “And well, you liked being on the receiving end, but not on the other one. Also, you used to think it was pretty fucking hot if I got myself ready for you while you watched. I kind of always wondered how it’d feel like if... well. I’ve done it with women, but it really doesn’t... But it’s you. You don’t have to...”
Dean brings his head down and shuts him up in the way that he knows always works, feeling strangely satisfied when Cas takes control of the kiss and flips them over so that Dean is on top. Right, he thinks as he breaks the kiss and slides down, can’t be too hard.
It’s true that Dean always liked this when it was with girls and that he has never really taken much into account the idea of doing it himself, though at this point he’d do it just because his future self doesn’t (hey, the more distance he puts between them, the better); but that’s really not the point. He takes his time to kiss his way down Cas’s chest and if he finds some scar tissue he takes care to spend a bit more time on there; when he’s done, he figures he should just go for it without over-thinking things (otherwise? High chances he’ll fuck up). He knows what Cas wants alright, but before he tentatively licks here and there, feeling Cas’s hard-on under his tongue, feeling somewhat satisfied when he feels Cas shiver; well, then let’s just do it, he thinks before taking Cas’s cock into his mouth and going straight where he should. He lets his tongue flick once under the head and from the way Cas moans he’s obviously doing this the right way. Good. It actually doesn’t feel much weird at all; maybe most of the turn-on comes from the fact that Cas is pretty much loving it (and yeah, his hands are tangled in Dean’s hair at this point and his moaning is very, very encouraging) but still. Better like this.
Dean moves his head up and down, finding a rythm he finds comfortable, still teasing that spot with his tongue and fuck if Cas saying that yes, yes, he should keep on just like this isn’t making him even more aroused. Anyway, he tries to ignore his own needs for now. It’s not what he has to pay attention to. Cas pulls on his hair tighter, says something resembling going to come even if it comes out garbled, probably because he wants to warn him, but Dean has no intention of moving an inch. He knows that it won’t take much; and yeah, it’s another flick of his tongue right there before Cas lets out a strangled moan that might be his name or might not and comes hard in Dean’s mouth, hard like someone who hasn’t gotten off in ages. Which is pretty much nonsense, but Dean knows the difference between a bunch of nameless faces and someone you give a damn about. He waits for Cas to ride out his orgasm and meanwhile he swallows it all to-the-last-drop. It tastes bitter and maybe it’s not exactly appealing, but the way Cas is shaking in pleasure underneath him and the way he’s looking at him now makes it completely worth it.
Hell, yes.
He has just half sat up when Cas’s hand reaches behind his neck and brings him down, crushing their lips together; Dean thinks that Cas is tasting himself in his fucking mouth and suddenly he finds himself so turned on that the neglect he’s giving his own erection is starting to feel painful. Still not caring for now, though. Not when Cas is all but fucking melting against him and whispering yes and missed you so-fucking-much whenever their lips aren’t touching. He takes a breath when it seems like the kissing is over, or at least he figures it is since Cas turned them over and he’s on top again. He reaches for the bag where he kept the weed which now is somewhere under the front seat and comes out with a condom and a half full bottle of lube, or at least Dean guesses it is since there’s no label whatsoever. Yeah, well, he doesn’t think that lube manufactures are in full swing, these times.
“It’s... well, all here,” Cas mutters, his cheeks still flushed, his eyes still fixed upon Dean’s and that’s the closest to old times Dean thinks they’ve been until now.
“More than enough,” Dean answers even if he doesn’t have an idea whether it is or not. But whatever, he’s set on doing this and if it isn’t enough they’ll come up with something else.
He tries not to notice how much Cas’s hand shakes as he hands him the bottle; his voice is even when he says to leave some for him, and Dean tries not to think about how fucked up it is that they’re using condoms. Shit, he’s clean and Cas is the only person in existence that should really not use condoms, but right. That Cas. This Cas not really. He nods and spreads his own legs slowly while Cas backs off a bit to give him more space. Right. Better. Still uncomfortable as fuck, but better than before.
He pours some of the lube into his fingers, careful not to waste it (seriously, not wasting lube. That’s the fucking end of days indeed), then takes a deep breath and lies against the door and spreading his legs some more. He doesn’t close his eyes even if it’s tempting; he needs to see Cas’s face as he does this. The second he touches his entrance he gasps out loud because really, totally so not familiar and it feels freaking weird, but he isn’t really the person who backs down at the first obstacle and so he just decides to go for it at once. He places his fingers near the hole again and pushes in at once, slow but steadily; he’s thankful that the finger is slippery because it half-hurts, but he goes as deep as he can before pulling out and pouring a bit more of lube on that finger and the next one. Pushing in again is easier now, the way already slick, and that’s why he manages to arrive a bit farther down. It doesn’t feel too unfamiliar anymore, even if it’s still weird. Right. He looks at Cas then, and there’s a look of something that Dean can’t decide if it’s lust, affection or what else; as Cas licks his lips, Dean takes another breath and adds a second finger, spreading his legs a bit wider. Oh, he mouths, and it feels good now even if still a bit painful because he’s stretching quite some here, but not enough to stop him really. He pulls his fingers out, pushes them in again another couple of times, feeling sweat running off his forehead and damn, his cock hurts for how freaking hard he is, but then a hand closes around his and pulls it away. He realizes that he missed the moment when Cas put that condom on him and used some of that lube for it, now it’s really almost over; well, he was kind of busy here, you know.
Then Cas leans down and kisses him with such tenderness that it aches, and Dean doesn’t think that he can take this without breaking down in apologies because that’s how it should have always been except that it isn’t, but then Cas’s hands are on his hips and Dean just hooks his legs behind Cas’s back and waits.
He doesn’t have to wait long.
It doesn’t even hurt that much. Right. It does hurt, but he did stretch himself open first and everything is as slick as it goes so he just bites his lips and nods ad Cas when he stops for one second. Cas keeps on slowly, slowly pushing before pulling and then pushing again. That second one comes easier and Dean nods again, thrusting his hips up in what he hopes is encouragement; and then Cas gives a third push and Dean feels a wave of pleasure spasming through him and the fact that his brain is supplying information (of course, you idiot, that’s your prostate, of course he’s making you see stars) gets completely overlooked when Cas smiles that half-devilish smile again and gives push number four after which they both, well, fucking lose it.
Cas speeds up and Dean meets the pace eagerly; it feels so fucking good and that’s exactly what Cas is repeating probably without even realizing it and Jesus, yeah, didn’t he think that Cas’s voice was a total turn on some time ago? Well. It fucking is. Cas is almost as hard as he was before, Dean figures his earlier show did help in that regard, and he moans in relief when Cas’s hand closes around his cock; Dean realizes that it’s slippery and yeah, probably there it goes the last of the lube, but who gives a damn. It feels good, no wait, it feels fantastic, and the way Cas is saying his name as he trails kisses all over his face is making something inside him melt. Both of them move in a way that is nothing short of frantic, Dean’s hands roaming across Cas’s shoulders while Cas keeps one on his cock and the other one on the scar on Dean’s shoulder and while nothing special happens it just feels intimate, oh-so-intimate, and dammit, Dean just hopes that for Cas this is as good as it’s for him now. It’s when Cas mutters a fuck, Dean which is definitely different in tone from everything else that he has said until now that Dean gets that he’s almost there; okay, he mouths, fuck, he adds for good measure, and then he looks up at Cas again, tries to ignore the stubble (wrong, his head screams) and concentrates on the blissful, oh-so-blissful expression tracing his features. He can’t hold it back anymore and he reaches for Cas’s face and brings him down, kisses him as he comes all over Cas’s hand hard, hard as he can’t remember coming since fucking ages, and then Cas is coming inside him too, moaning something resembling Dean’s name into his mouth and oh, yeah, this, he thinks as Cas’s hands grip his shoulders as he comes again, not as hard as before but still something indeed. Hell yes.
Dean feels fucking blissed out for a while after Cas collapses on his chest, and Dean doesn’t even try to move, or to move Cas. It feels nice, it feels good, Cas is warm and looking as blissed out as Dean feels and just, no. It’s fine. They still have some time before getting ready and whatever shit their fearless leader aka himself has planned out for them, well, it can wait. For now.
He can’t resist placing a light kiss on Cas’s temple, which is right there next to his mouth; Cas shivers again and Dean realizes that dammit, it’s chilly inside. Not that he wants to move. He so doesn’t. He waits for Cas to pull out and grab some old shirt of his from the bag of miracles. He wipes himself half-clean and passes it to Dean so that he can do the same; they dress in a silence which isn’t uncomfortable but not the soothing kind of silence either. When they’re both back in their respective clothes, Dean realizes that it isn’t exactly true and that he ended up with Cas’s green jacket underneath his blue one and that Cas ended up with his. They look the same.
What the...
“It was yours. The one you’re wearing. I guess it’s the same.”
“I gave it to you back then?”
“When my old clothes weren’t presentable anymore, yes.”
Cas’s voice is quiet, it’s obviously a nice memory and probably the first and only one he will ever share with him; it doesn’t matter, though. It’s alright as it is.
“Dean...”
“If you’re thanking me, don’t even try that. I didn’t do it because I wanted to make you a favor.”
“... right,” Cas answers, and there’s that small smile again, a recognizable one. For a second, Cas looks at the bag still under the driver’s seat, his hands twitching in his lap, a frown over his face.
“Hey. I’m not here to judge anyone. If you want to take some of that stuff, I won’t be the one complaining. Just don’t offer me anything, okay?”
“Oh, you... just... don’t... don’t ever change. Don’t ever... or try not to, at least. You know how it went, just don’t...”
“Believe me, I don’t want that. I think I know where I fucked up though.”
“Then do something. if you really want to promise shit to me, just promise you’ll do something.”
“Alright. I can do that.”
“I won’t thank you.”
“Good. Just fucking don’t. Hey, how much time we have before we need to go?”
Cas looks out of the window, then shrugs. “One hour and a half. Two at best. Why, do you want to sleep?”
“Why not.”
Cas shakes his head and shrugs, his hand going to the door. “I left the Valium at the camp. Can’t really sleep without it, you know. I’ll just get in the front and leave you the seat. You’d probably be more comfortable.”
“Don’t.”
Cas looks at him like he has just gone crazy. “What? But...”
“Y’know what? I’m sure future me isn’t one that stays after. At least since he started to become a dick.”
Cas’s eyebrow slightly raises and he looks so tired that Dean feels that lump in his throat forming again. “He isn’t. Why?”
”I guess this would be the equivalent, right?”
“It’s hardly the same thing, Dean. But I guess you just want to distance yourself, huh?”
“Something like that. I can share a backseat, you know.”
There’s that small, fond smile again and five minutes after Dean isn’t really surprised that it ended with his back against the door again while Cas is somewhat sprawled above him, even if there isn’t really anything sexual in this.
He isn’t really surprised that Valium or not Cas ended up fast asleep a minute after his head touched Dean’s shoulder.
He isn’t surprised at all when his hand cards through Cas’s hair once again and Cas all but curls into the touch and into him, all things considered. There isn’t much else he can do for now, but until he’s back where he belongs there aren't many other options.
“Well, since you can’t listen to me and you won’t stop me from saying it...” he whispers, realizing that he’s not going to get any sleep this round, “this isn’t going to fucking happen. I swear it won’t.”
He doesn’t know why he felt the need to say it, but he feels better. He feels like he owed Cas that, and fuck any pessimist attitude Cas has grown in five years or whatever. It’s not like Cas can complain, out as he is. At least now he has a resolution taken. Not much, but still. He tightens his hold around Cas’s shoulders and just waits for the sun to rise. If for a second this whole situation feels less fucked up than usual, well, he figures it’s just the proof things can be not fucked up. He’ll see that it does happen.
End.
Title: And It Breaks My Heart To See You This Way
Pairing: Dean/Castiel even if it's actually Past!Dean/Future!Cas
Rating: NC17, baby
Word count: 9936
Spoilers: heavy for 5x04.
Summary: Dean knows he’s trying to pick up some pieces that are so broken he won’t ever be able to put them back together, not even for a short while, but still. He owes Cas a try, at least.
A/N: so. I owed lasamy birthday fic and she told me to get inspired by 5x04 and go wild with it, which is exactly what I did. I hope you like it ♥ ♥ ♥ and if you don't I'll write you that crack anyway. ;) Apart from that, title is stolen from a Flogging Molly song which imo fits for the pairing but that's all the relation it has with this. Also using for 2x5obsessions #5, all that is left.
“That’s how I roll,” Cas says before letting out another of those laughs which Dean has started to think of as hateful the first second he heard one; Dean just takes a breath and looks out of the window because he just can’t bear to even glance at his left. This is so wrong on so many fucking levels that he doesn’t even know where to begin to count them, and the fact that it’s the end of days doesn’t justify it. Fine, it might justify people hardening, or taking drastic decisions, or trying to forget what’s going on, but not to this degree. It doesn’t justify Cas being this wreck and it doesn’t justify his own fucking attitude.
He thinks his head is stuck on the torturing.
Christ, if he really started doing it again (and he has this idea that no one was pulling some sick joke on him; actually, it seemed that Cas was pretty intent on making him get what was at stake exactly and he can only imagine why), it means that he just gave up on whatever fucking humanity he had left somewhere along the line and Dean just wants to throw up at the idea. Since Cas pulled him out, priority number two after dealing with the major fuckery going on in his life was trying not to let Hell get to him again, and he has always known he was walking a fine line (let’s just not think about that time when someone asked that of him); this looks just like Hell got to him again fucking alright, which means that he doesn’t give a shit anymore, and if he doesn’t give a shit anymore it means that he’s practically back there in his head, at least, and Dean wants to throw up (again) for the hundredth time since he ended up back to the future. He kills the instinct though; he figures that they really can’t use it right now.
He dares glancing at Cas again; he’s looking at the road ahead with slightly unfocused eyes, but Dean has to admit that his driving is pretty competent. He isn’t catching any more holes than necessary, his hands are a perfect ten-and-two on the steering wheel, he has complete control of the car (it’s not like Dean can’t recognize when someone is a competent driver or not); pretty remarkable, for someone driving while popping fucking amphetamines dry.
“Who taught you?”
“Who taught me what?”
“To drive. I figure you didn’t learn on your own.”
Cas shakes his head for a brief second and keeps on looking ahead.
“Nope. It should’ve been you and it was Chuck.”
“What?”
“It was after it was clear I wasn’t going to use alternative means of transport again. But I’d really like it if we could drop it here.”
“Why?”
“It’s not what I want to think about while I actually drive,” Cas answers before taking out of his pocket the damned bottle again. He swallows another pill dry. Shit. Dean brings a hand to his forehead and tries to remember the program. Someone had told him they were going to reach the fucking place about three hours before dawn and they could use that time to catch some sleep in the cars. Right. Fine. He’s going to corner Cas then. Dean needs answers, a lot of fucking answers, and after all Castiel seems like the one person around who will provide them; or at least, he’s the only one who has answered straight at him until now anyway, and the fact that now he does answer straight after all is pretty much the only improvement he can witness in this reality, at least concerning Cas. His future self sure as fuck doesn’t count, not when it took two conversations and a good bunch of lies to find out about Sam.
Sam.
Shit.
The first thing Dean is doing when he gets his ass back to the right time is calling him. He tries not to think about what he said before Zachariah decided to pull this awesome joke on him. He can’t afford that now.
Also, the second thing he’s doing is keeping an eye on Cas and make sure he never comes near a fucking damned cigarette on his watch, or ever. Or near anything remotely addictive, and patience it if his plans to make Cas try coffee will remain plans.
--
It’s an hour or so before Cas pulls over and turns the engine off; Dean’s future self storms out of his own car and passes in front of theirs, saying they should get some sleep while they can, and then turns away.
Dick, Dean thinks again, and at this point he made peace with the fact that he’s insulting himself.
He’s about to ask Cas again when he sees him reaching for a bag on the backseat; he searches for something inside and when he’s done, in his hand there are a joint and a lighter. Dean doesn’t even try to discourage him; a minute later, there’s a sharp smell of weed filling up the car and Dean thinks he might want to throw up. Again. Cas looks more relaxed, though; Dean isn’t too surprised. Weed is known for that too, anyway.
“So.”
“So what?”
“You aren’t driving anymore.”
“Well, yeah, I definitely am not.”
“Then tell me.”
“Long story, Dean.”
“We have another three hours at least. And Cas, while I did completely get how you roll and I have an idea about how the other me here rolls, I don’t roll that way. And you should know it. Would you just tell me? If driving is a sore subject, fine. Just tell me what the fuck happened.”
“Don’t you think that I might not want to talk about it?” comes the answer, the words slightly slurred, and of course Cas is smiling as he talks, that empty stoned smile which Dean would very much like to wipe off his face. It just sounds like Cas doesn’t give a damn anymore, and well, fine, he probably doesn’t; that’s exactly why Dean needs to know. He needs to make fucking sure that whatever went on, this doesn’t happen again. If Cas doesn’t want to cooperate, he’ll make him.
He takes a breath before getting out of the car and slamming the door; he gets on the driver’s side, opens Cas’s door, takes his arm and drags him out. He feels physical pain as he slams Cas’s free wrist against the car; the other winces slightly and Dean feels guilty because sure as hell this Cas doesn’t need any kind of unnecessary hurt at this point, but if it does pay off then he won’t ever be like this. Not on Dean’s watch anyway.
“Cas, please. I know you think that even if I try to change things we’ll end up here, but I can’t stand this. I can’t stand seeing you like this. I can’t stand seeing myself, dammit. I need to know. And if you don’t want to tell me the whole story at least just tell me what happened to you. Don’t say life. Just don’t, okay?”
Cas looks up at him for one second, seeming slightly more focused than before; then he shrugs and takes another smoke from the joint still between his shaking fingers.
“Tell you. Right. And why would you be so interested?”
“What the fuck of a question is that?”
“Well, you stopped giving a damn after one point, and you were here to see it.”
“I’m not him. And sorry but I give a damn. Maybe more than one.”
For a second something in Cas’s features softens and Dean can see something behind hazy, unfocused blue eyes which resembles fondness too much to mistake it for anything else, before he takes another drag and looks the other way.
“I know you do. You do. Believe me, I know. Fine. Fine, you know what? You asked for it, you’ll get it. You want to know just about the decadent part of it or you want the whole picture?”
“Whole picture.”
“Fine, whole picture it is. It sort of started after Detroit. For the both of us, more or less. Detroit was two years ago. I still was what I was. You still were who you were. Right, maybe you were hardened, some, but... anyway. You decided I needed to fucking learn to drive, and you were actually going to let me even use your car, but I always refused. Said I didn’t need it. Guess what? Detroit happens and one day or two after I realize I need to eat and sleep and all the fun that comes with being human, I also realize I need to shave. And I cut myself while I do shave. And the wound doesn’t heal. Clearly, I really need to learn to drive at this point, but no one was actually thinking about that. Know why?”
“Why?” Dean asks, sure that he doesn’t want to know it. Cas takes another drag, a nervous one, even thought it’s very deep. Dean thinks he will never be able to smell weed in his whole life without throwing up.
“Because, me and you. Back then. Let’s put it like this. Chuck always said we were an item.”
Cas pauses and Dean just looks at him. He doesn’t even blink. He can’t afford to blink. Also, considering his future self’s and Cas’s exchanges, he had sort of understood that there was something between that which wasn’t just lost friendship. And Dean will admit that he has thought about his Cas that way, lately. He just never dared acting on it. He can sort of believe he would at some point, though, so... yeah. Fine. Not exactly a surprise.
“What? Not freaking out?”
“I doubt that’s what freaks me out most here. So?”
“Better. So. Detroit, you know? You weren’t exactly in the mood for talking. Or for consoling me over my losses. Or for teaching me how to drive. Or for anything which wasn’t either staying closed in your room without letting anyone in or storm out of the camp and kill some zombies. I tried. I really did. You just didn’t listen. But that wasn’t really the point where it all went to hell. That was a couple of months later.”
“What happened?”
Cas takes another breath and looks almost worried when he realizes that he has maybe just another couple of hits before the joint goes off. He shrugs and takes his second-to-last one.
“First of all, you left the car there. You saw how it is. It ended with Chuck teaching me how to drive on some crappy thing that we had around in the camp.”
“Chuck?”
“Yeah. Chuck. So? Just, anyway. Two months later, Bobby went back to South Dakota in order to get some stuff from his house. Someone from camp went with him.”
“And...?”
“Demons. They ambushed them and killed them all. That was when you really, really, really started to lose it. Took you three months to find them, it probably would’ve took you less if the Croatoan hadn’t started spreading at that time, and then you wanted answers.”
“You aren’t telling me that...”
Cas’s eyes are so empty as he takes a last drag and looks up at him that Dean feels genuinely frightened. He lets Cas’s wrist go and lets out a breath of relief when Cas doesn’t move.
“I tried to talk you out of it. Told you all kinds of shit. That I dragged a man out of Hell for some reason and that you hated it when you tortured someone the first and last time you did it after I brought you out. That this was going to kill you, or at least the you I cared about. The you for whom I did all this and for whom I’d have given my fucking life. The you for whom I stayed and lost every damned thing. I think I begged you or some crap like that, even. You know what?”
“I went in anyway.”
“Yeah. You just said that you were sad to prove me wrong first. When you got out of there... boy, if you thought I didn’t like what came out of that other room back then, you don’t know how much I didn’t like round two.”
Silence suddenly falls and Dean can’t bring himself to raise his hand to stop Castiel when he fishes some other bottle out of his pocket and swallows dry a couple of pills. Xanax, he reads on the label. Jesus Christ. Maybe, he figures, Cas needs this shit in order to go on with the talking, at this point. He hopes it’s just because of that and he starts feeling guilty because he did ask first, but he doubts that it does much harm. Considering where they are, or Cas is, or whatever.
“Next thing I know, you just don’t give a crap. Other next thing I know, I can’t deal with anything because I’m fucking human and I just don’t know how to start dealing with it and Chuck is the only one who will give a damn. Sadly, it isn’t enough. Though don’t think I didn’t appreciate it. Especially when he came with some beer he stole from the supplies. That was nice. Other next thing I know, you start being even more reckless than usual. Final next thing I know, we’re on a mission, I fuck my balance up because I’m still not used to needing to run, my foot is broken and I don’t get eaten by some zombie just because someone near me shoots them all and manages to get me into some car.”
Castiel takes another breath and looks at his feet. Dean doesn’t dare moving. He feels sick. He can sort of see where this is all heading.
“So, I’m in pain. A whole damn lot of pain. You drop by sometimes, but you don’t say shit. And I’m stuck there. We had this doctor, back then. Good guy. Died in a mission some time ago. Anyway, we had some morphine and I was in so much pain because I just wasn’t used to it that he decided to give me some. It worked. Then it was other painkillers. Then I couldn’t fucking sleep because they were messing up my system and there came the sleeping pills. And I couldn’t exactly cope with it and there wasn’t no one around who realized what was good for former angels or not and then I just couldn’t stay without. Then after one month when I was managing to get up and move around this girl gets into my cabin.”
“And?”
“And she blows me. Right on the bed. She was high, but I didn’t even try to push her away. She was someone. Just, someone and she was there. And she had the absinthe. From there... well. You don’t even want to know what exactly I tried. But I just couldn’t give a damn. It made me feel good or at least momentarily forget where I was and why I was there and what were you doing a couple of cabins down the road. Took you six months to find out.”
“And what did I...”
“Pathetic son of a bitch, if I remember right.”
Cas's voice drops to a whisper and Dean thinks he does indeed remember right.
“That was it. I think it was the first time I called you fearless leader, too, by the way. Whatever. The girl brought a friend, she brought another friend and I figured I’d fully embrace decadence for what it was. Better than fucking deal with reality, right?”
“Did I... did he...”
Cas’s laugh is bitter. “He doesn’t care. You don’t. Not anymore, at least. But I get it. I really do. There was a point when you’d just break. I figured I just hoped I could avoid you ever getting there, but... looks like you just brought me with you. But it’s fine. Really. It is. It went like this, it’s done, done, and just... that’s it. Satisfied, now?”
His voice is verging on hysterical and the last two sentences’ words had tumbled over each other, not exactly slurring but giving plenty of evidence of Cas’s current state; Dean is still frozen, unable to act on anything, wishing that this was all some nightmare (and maybe it is, except that this can become reality and he really needs to avoid it at all costs) and that he didn’t have to see this. But he has to and he is, and that’s when his hand starts moving without his brain’s consent and fingers close softly around Cas’ wrist as he obviously reaches for the Xanax again. If he sees him swallowing some of that crap dry again Dean will probably throw up here and now, dammit. He sees that Cas’s frame is shaking all over and that he isn’t doing anything to get free of his very, very loose hold; something forms a lump in Dean’s throat as his other hand reaches Cas’s chin and slowly, gently turns his face up so that he can look at him.
He meets eyes which were always too big for their own good but that look just enormous now; they’re slightly more focused now, but still hazy and there are some tears threatening to fall from the corners and Cas turns his head again shaking it just merely five seconds after.
“Cas, what...”
“Fuck. Fuckfuckfuck.”
“What?”
“Just... you used... you used to look at me like that. Before. I thought I had forgotten that. Woah. Fantastic. That’s just fucking fantastic.”
His body tenses and he looks like he’s ready to bolt and go off and get... fucking lost or killed or whatever and Dean just knows that he can’t stand this. The wreck in front of him might be everything his Cas never was (and God forbid, Dean would rather have him a clueless, angelic virgin any second than this) but point is that it doesn’t matter; it takes looking at him straight in the face again for Dean to see that this is Cas alright. Beyond fucked, sure, and without wings and the stick up his ass (oh, how he misses it now), but it’s still Cas, and if Dean thinks that he gave up everything for Dean to end up like this with this jerk of a future him who is everything Dean always swore to himself he’d never become, not after Hell especially, well, his stomach turns and the knot that forms there is huge and it might just be three hours until dawn, but if there’s the slight chance that Dean can fix at least some of this... fuck it, he will.
It doesn’t even freak him out that whatever is going through Cas’ mind at this point is probably memories of them being an item. Fine. He already admitted it, he has been having that kind of thoughts about his Cas for a while. And now, when he gets back home, he might even start acting on them before he had planned because fuck it, if this Cas is in love wih him then his Cas won’t say fuck you and disappear in a beat of wings. So, well, it’s wrong if he does anything now, but not so much maybe, and considering that his future him is not around tonight, he’ll stop worrying about him. Dean’s hand gets back on Cas’s neck and he’s as gentle as he can while he brushes the exposed skin there. Cas is still shaking and still looks at him like he’s going to disappear any second, back to his time where he belongs anyway maybe, and Dean knows it isn’t a problem. Not for now, at least.
“Cas.”
“I... God, I just... It’s been years, fuck...”
Dean doesn’t have time to freak out over the fact that he’s not freaking out at the amount of swearing coming out of Castiel’s mouth.
“Cas. Can’t we... get in the back?”
“The back...?”
“It’s... chilly. Out here, I mean.”
It really isn’t, not too much at least, but Dean can’t do this out in the open. Or better, he can, but he doesn’t want his fearless leader persona to catch them by chance or something. This mess is all his fault, or their fault or whatever, and Dean wants whatever happens now to be intimate, just a thing between the two of them, no one else in the picture. The orgies aren’t the point; this Cas doesn’t agree with intimate much anymore, he thinks, and it’s just so wrong. For a second he starts to think about the things he will do to his Cas when he’s back, or the things he will say, but then he pushes the thought out of his head. This is here and now and thinking about trench coats, half smiles and head tilts and conversations about personal space isn’t really his wisest idea. Cas nods though, his still shaking hand opens the back door of the car and he climbs in. Dean follows and shuts it close.
“Dean, what...”
“Shut up,” he mutters before placing a hand around Cas’ shoulder and one around his waist; Cas is suddenly still as Dean draws him slowly against Dean’s chest until his cheek rests over dark hair. It doesn’t last long. Five seconds after he stops, just when he was wondering whether this wasn’t a terrible idea, shaking hands clutch his jacket behind his shoulder and Cas moves harshly until he’s practically in Dean’s lap, his frame trembling all over and his face buried in the hollow of Dean’s neck. Dean wishes he could distinguish how much of the shaking is drugs and how much isn’t, but maybe it isn’t even important. He takes a second to notice that Cas’s legs are draped in a quite weird angle before closing any space that was left between them. He keeps an arm around the former angel’s waist while his other hand rubs random circles all over Cas’s back (and doesn’t that shirt feel so wrong) and he has to bite his lip in order not to gasp when he realizes that Cas is actually pressing back against his hand wherever it roams.
Jesus, he thinks, this is so fucked up. I am so fucked up, he adds then, because he thinks that a good chunk of fault here lies with his fearless leader persona who apparently sees it fit not to give a shit anymore. And he has thought, at times, that he hated himself. Right. Sure. Never as much as right now, that’s a given.
He takes a breath and without moving his hands from where they are he manages to turn around and maneuver the both of them so that he’s lying on the backseat with Cas on top of him; he hears a content sigh coming from somewhere near his shoulder when they’re settled, maybe the first not completely depressing sound he has heard coming out of this Cas’ mouth since he got into his cabin, and so he just keeps on rubbing those circles. At one point his hand starts raising up on its own accord and there’s something that makes him want to cry in the way Cas turns his head against Dean’s hand when his fingers get tangled in black hair which is way cleaner than Dean would have figured, especially if the personal hygiene goods aren’t hot stuff around camp. It’s like Cas is fucking starved for this and maybe he is, orgies or not orgies, and before Dean can ask he gets an answer.
“It’s been so much time,” Cas murmurs against his skin, and Dean barely hears it since it’s muffled and Cas’s voice is impossibly low.
“So much time since what?” he answers, keeping his voice low as his nails lightly scrape skin on Cas’s nape.
“Since this meant something. Since you,” Cas definitely slurs, and Dean has an idea that if he wasn’t high on whatever shit he’s high now he probably wouldn’t have said this. Or maybe he would have. After all, at least since he died for him, Cas really never has been one that keeps things for himself. Nice contrast, Dean thinks, considering that if there was some contest for keeping stuff to one’s self Dean would probably win that hands down. Look where this is going to bring him.
“So you really do like past me, or me, or whatever?” Dean asks, trying to keep his voice from breaking, because there’s something about this whole situation that makes him ache. Dean knows he’s trying to pick up some pieces that are so broken he won’t ever be able to put them back together, not even for a short while, but still. He owes Cas a try, at least.
Cas raises his head slightly and if Dean’s shirt feels slightly damp, Dean doesn’t care. Cas is still not exactly looking at him, more at the battered leather of the backseat, but his arms are still tight around Dean’s neck and he figures it’s enough. For now.
“If you only knew how much I missed you. You know. The first times... it felt good because... I kind of saw you. I mean, I knew it wasn’t real, but still, it was better than... you know. Then after a while I didn’t anymore. Guess it was because I was adjusted. Oh. Could... you do that again?”
Cas’s voice trails at the last question and Dean tries to understand what he means, except that right, he has just stopped beating around the bush and instead of scraping here and there he has fucking honest to god carded his fingers through Cas’s hair. He does it again, Cas nuzzles closer and Dean decides that he isn’t stopping until his fingers can’t take it anymore.
“Mm, yes. Feels so nice. Like it used to. Sorry, I shouldn’t be saying that. To you of anyone. ‘S not your fault, really. Just, try to stay like this, alright?”
Too much is the only sequence of words running through Dean’s head. When he answers, his voice is choked. He can’t do anything for it.
“Cas, I just... I swear that...”
“Don’t. Don’t. Don’t swear or promise me anything. You never know.” Cas suddenly looks at him and Dean has to look back. God, those eyes, he just can’t tear his stare away, not when even if Cas is still shaking they’re a lot more focused now than before. There are small wrinkles on the corners which weren’t there before, not in Dean’s time anyway, and they are the eyes of someone who wants to believe something but can’t bring himself to. Christ. “You never know what’s gonna happen.”
“It doesn’t have to be like this. Fuck, I can’t see you like this, I can’t see myself like that, and maybe he doesn’t care but...”
“Oh, Dean. He did. Don’t think he didn’t. He did care, or... you did, whatever. It wasn’t always this way. Don’t promise when you don’t know if you can maintain it.”
“It doesn’t have to be this way.”
“I wish I could say I believe you. Fuck, there was a time when I would have without even thinking about it. I actually think it still was like that... when you come from, I mean.”
Dean swallows and when he realizes that Cas started shaking harder pulls Cas’s head down against his shoulder again, resuming his hair-carding business; shit, if Cas is telling the truth, and no reason to think he isn’t, then in his time... damn. He needs to get into Cas’s head (his Cas, of course) that whatever crap Dean says isn’t always the right thing. When he’s back. But now he isn’t and he’ll worry about it another time. Yeah, another time. Right.
“Dean?”
”Yeah?”
“Could you... do me a favor?”
Dean takes a breath. “Anything you wish,” he answers, and he isn’t really surprised when Cas tenses for a second. Yeah, so what. He didn’t choose his wording at random.
“Tell me about him. Me. Well. You got that.”
“What? You want me to talk to you about yourself?”
“As I was. As I am in your year or whatever it is.”
Dean isn’t sure this is a good idea. Actually, he’s sure it’s a very, very bad idea. Still. He said anything you wish.
“Okay. Fine. Uhm. You’re most definitely still an angel, even if thanks to your awesome act of free will you’re kind of less of one than you were before. Technically, because, er, well, let’s say that in practice I think that your points on the angelic chart got way higher. You know. Talking actions and such. As far as I know, you’re still a virgin. Actually if now... er, past you knew about the orgies and stuff he’d probably hyperventilate at best. Or if you mentioned women at all, I think. Even if you aren’t too adverse to alcohol. Or beer, at least. You don’t get three quarters of the shit I say but... well, I kind of like that. I mean, it just wouldn’t be you if you weren’t that clueless anyway. Your sense of fashion still sucks but I have to say I kind of like the coat. You still have that damned faith both in your father and in yours truly aka myself which sometimes frankly scares me, but I kind of...”
Wouldn’t want you any other way is what he was about to say, but Dean stops himself before he does. Fuck this shit, he doesn’t want to say anything that could imply making explicit comparisons.
“... I kind of like it. I don’t have much, but you probably have enough for the both of us. I just... well, now this sounds pathetic and if I told past you, he’d probably tilt his head that way and think that something must be possessing me because I really never said such a thing in front of him or stuff, but... shit, took me thirty years and the weirdest shit happening, but you’re pretty much the fucking first and only friend I’ve had until now and... I... Cas?”
The shaking got worse. Wonderful. He just knew. He just hopes it’s because of too much shit kicking in.
“Sorry. I just... I just wanted... you know. These days you’re stuck on useless or pathetic or the sort. Except... I thought it’d feel good, and it did, but still...”
Dean would seriously want to punch both Cas and himself (the future one, of course) because while Cas seemingly likes to leave sentences hanging open, he understood this indeed. And if Cas needs him to say some nice things about his past self because current Dean won’t tell him anything even remotely nice...
Well, fuck this shit. Dean might not exactly be the greatest optimist that ever lived, but he has his share of practice in the art of finding something positive among a fuck hell of a lot of negative, even if it doesn’t exactly always work. He hopes it does this time. He sits up so that his back is almost completely lying against the door of the car (thankfully it isn’t narrow) and takes Cas by the shoulders so that they’re facing each other.
“Now. You listen to me, alright? I don’t think you need to hear from me how awesome you were back then and compare it with how much you fucking suck now.”
“Isn’t that the truth?” Cas answers, still that fixed, insufferable, empty smile on his face, and Dean just wants it to stop. “At least I wasn’t useless back then. You have much nicer things to say about this now? Sorry for that, but life happens. As I said. I appreciate that...”
“You damned... screw it, you aren’t useless. And if future me can’t see it, screw him too. If he doesn’t, then I really swear to myself I won’t ever let it get bad.”
“What is that he can’t see?” Cas asks, his voice suddenly lower, barely a whisper and strangely unsure, and he sounds a lot less under the influence now.
“Shit, Cas, you’re still here.”
“What...?”
“I told you before, right? I mean, it took me thirty years before I could call someone a friend. Now, you know, friends are usually supposed to stick. Not too hard to get, right? And... you did everything you did and lost everything and you didn’t leave the second time he, I, whatever, pulled up some serious shit, and you just stuck when as far as I know you’re the first person who has really done this for me. If I, if he became such a son of a bitch that he doesn’t see or appreciate it, well, screw him. Or us. I fucking do and even if it’s probably too late, since I’m sure he never said it... thank you. And, also on his behalf even if he probably doesn’t know it anyway, sorry for not keeping up my end. And I’m not saying this because I’m humoring you. I mean it.”
Things happen fast, after that.
One second, he hears a soft, choked but someway relieved sob escaping from Cas’s throat; the other second, Cas’s face is inches from his own, lips so close they could kiss if one of them moved, eyes which are looking at him with such gratefulness that it twists Dean’s insides and yeah, fuck, who cares about the consequences. Dean nods because he doesn’t want to risk reading things wrong and anyway, a nod always works anyway, and whatever Cas wants to do Dean isn’t going to deny; then lips are covering his, just a bare touch even if they don’t move. Of course, indeed, and Dean presses back a bit, just a bit, enough to make Cas understand that he’s okay with this, more than okay with this even if he’d have never thought that this would be his first kiss with Cas. Even though it technically might not be, if future him and Cas... whatever. He won’t get an headache over that. Then Cas’s hands are cradling his face, the skin way less soft and way more calloused than Dean remembers, but there’s such carefulness in the gesture, like Cas actually wants to savor it, that he really doesn’t mind; the kiss becomes a lot less chaste and JesusChristalmighty runs through Dean’s head as Cas’s tongue maps every inch it touches. Cas kisses him thoroughly, like he can’t get enough, and with such skill that Dean can’t help feel amazed for one second before he realizes that yeah, orgies anyone? One will learn how to kiss if that’s his hobby, right? He brings a hand behind Cas’s neck again and the other to his hair and he feels Cas sighing in pleasure when he does; there’s something hard pressing against Dean’s thigh and well, fuck, if Cas can get this hard even if he’s on every possible kind of influence it does mean something, Dean figures.
Not that it’s important. He lets Cas take control but tries to keeps things slow. He wants this to be good. He wants this to be fucking good as much as he had hoped for Cas’ first time to be fucking good back then, and now he won’t dare asking if it had been with him (Dean is honest enough to admit, now, that the whorehouse had happened because at the time he hadn’t realized that Cas might have been interested in him and not in women, otherwise, well...) and how was it. Right now it doesn’t matter. Cas might be the wreck that’s in front of Dean, but it’s still Cas and he deserves it to be fucking good.
He doesn’t know how much the kiss lasts. He knows it’s a while and he knows it was good, even if there’s something about the way he could taste the weed on Cas’s tongue which was totally and utterly wrong, but after a while it got easier not to notice. Cas’s forehead rests against his while they breathe, and it’s almost synchronized, look at that; Cas’s hands are still there, cradling his face like he’s fucking surprised that Dean is there and that he can touch him. Talk about fucked up, but that’s established anyway.
“Oh, I missed you so much,” Cas says, his voice breaking on the last word, and Dean just brings his head down and kisses him again, and not the way he has kissed countless random hook-ups but the way he kissed Cassie when they were a serious thing and he had decided to tell her, the way that he hopes screams that this isn’t out of pity but just out of the fact that Dean wants it. And he does. He does want it as much as he wants Cas as he is in 2009, but this really doesn’t change shit. It’s the same person; changed, yeah, but still the same and he wants this Cas too. If he just managed to make Cas get it, but he’ll work on that.
It’s easy to ignore the taste of weed after a while, when you’re kissed like it’s a matter of life and death, and maybe it is; there’s a point when he doesn’t feel it anymore, or maybe he’s just adjusted. As they kiss, though, Dean moves his hands and takes care to let them trail at random, touching Cas everywhere they can reach; one moves under his shirt and as Dean feels Cas’s hips under his fingertips, he thinks that he’s really way too thin. Chuck would probably say that food is scarce. Dean can believe that.
Cas arches under the touch and Dean swallows moans into the still ongoing kiss; Dean doesn’t break it and instead pushes both of his hands under the shirt. It’s Cas that breaks the kiss next, and quite abruptly for that matter. He gets rid of his shirt and while he does Dean tries to sit up and gets rid of his jacket and shirt, letting them fall on the floor of the car next to that hippie thing that Cas was wearing; for a second they just stare at each other. Cas is obviously checking every single inch of him out, not that Dean minds, and Dean almost gasps in shock when he sees that Cas does have a few scars of his own. Strange. He has always imagined Cas as... well, completely scar-less. For someone who heals magically, how can you do otherwise? Now he doesn’t anymore, though. Right?
He reaches out slowly; he lets a finger trace a white straight line on Cas’s hip, so faded that it’s almost invisible, he ignores a faint red hickey on his shoulder, he kisses a not-so-red messy scar in the crook of his elbow imagining too easily why is it there and that finally does it.
One second his lips are tracing scarred skin, the other second Cas’ hands are on his wrists and he’s pinning one against the window of the car and the other one against the backseat; their frames are touching and Cas is looking at him with such an intense stare that Dean shivers for a second, and then he realizes that finally Cas took the fucking initiative and he sends a half-grin in his direction. That’s how he needs this to go; he has this idea that this version of Cas has never fucking taken anything which isn’t what meaningless sex can give you in ages and now he needs Cas to take. Dean knows how to give, anyway, even if it seems like he has forgotten it in the last five years.
He rubs his thigh against Cas’s then, and it’s not a surprise when hands reach the waist of his jeans and start pulling them down; Dean really wishes they weren’t in a car, but well. It’s not like he hasn’t had the experience already, and at least, as established before, the car isn’t narrow. They manage to get rid of both of their jeans and underwear before Cas is all over him again, naked skin on naked skin, strangely warm and, Dean thinks, definitely lacking a stick up his ass. He’s somewhat more loose-limbed than Dean would have thought, but it doesn’t matter. Actually, as soon as he feel Cas’s hard-on pressed against his thigh Dean loses a good chunk of coherency because fuck, now Cas is rubbing slowly, so very slowly against him and oh, shit, Dean knows he has just basically whimpered but the rhythm is something excruciating and fuck, who knew that Cas could be such a tease?
Well. Considering how once he helped him in front of a vending machine maybe yeah, there were the seeds in there showing that Cas could indeed become such a tease, but still. Fuck. He looks up and he thinks his heartbeat's speed gets a lot up when he sees a sort of wicked grin on Cas’s face, and it’s not drugs. Or maybe something is, after all the crap Cas had while they were talking he wouldn’t be surprised, but this is almost all sober and therefore almost all Cas and he’s just so goddamn glad to see it that he has to raise his head a bit and kiss Cas right there and then. Yes, he thinks as the kiss goes on and Cas is still doing that hellish thing on Dean's thigh even if he did speed up a bit, thank you so very much, that’s it. Still fucked up like like a few things in his life, and it surely makes the top three, but at least it’s as right as it gets and Cas looks at least slightly more like himself. Though well, the way his tongue is currently tracing Dean’s nipple after the kiss ended is definitely not a his-Cas thing to do, but he likes to imagine that one day it could happen under less fucked up circumstances. Maybe.
Doesn’t matter though; he arches up as he feels his nipple hardening and damn, the fact that Cas is working on the right one with his tongue and the left one with his hand is making Dean want to come right this fucking moment but that just would not do. He closes his eyes and just lets himself feel it, at least until the contact is gone and Dean wants to curse, but he manages to refrain himself and opens his eyes again. Cas is still sprawled on top of him, still pressing slowly against his thigh, his cheeks are slightly flushed and sure as fuck he looks way healthier than he has looked in the last two days or whatever. He looks like he’s about to ask him a question but something keeps him from it and Dean fights the urge to roll his eyes.
“Spit it out. Whatever’s on your mind, just spit it out. I said anything, right?”
”Nah. Let it go. It’s nothing, let’s just...”
“Cas. Tell me. Whatever kinky shit is passing through your head, I won’t bolt out of this car. Not that it’d be a wise idea anyway. If I’m not on board with that I’ll just say no and it’ll be that.”
A hand suddenly touches his cock and Dean gasps once, then fingers get under the head scraping lightly; Cas’ head retreats down and when fingers are replaced with tongue Dean realizes he can’t just stop the flow of obscenities leaving his mouth. Which, well, seems like Cas likes it since his tongue flicks there another couple of times before he stops and his face is inches away from Dean’s.
“You liked that?”
“Does it seem to you like I didn’t?”
“Yeah. Right. Not really. Well, I was cheating. I knew you’d like it. From when we were an item, you know. Anyway, we never... did it like this,” he says gesturing between him and Dean. “And well, you liked being on the receiving end, but not on the other one. Also, you used to think it was pretty fucking hot if I got myself ready for you while you watched. I kind of always wondered how it’d feel like if... well. I’ve done it with women, but it really doesn’t... But it’s you. You don’t have to...”
Dean brings his head down and shuts him up in the way that he knows always works, feeling strangely satisfied when Cas takes control of the kiss and flips them over so that Dean is on top. Right, he thinks as he breaks the kiss and slides down, can’t be too hard.
It’s true that Dean always liked this when it was with girls and that he has never really taken much into account the idea of doing it himself, though at this point he’d do it just because his future self doesn’t (hey, the more distance he puts between them, the better); but that’s really not the point. He takes his time to kiss his way down Cas’s chest and if he finds some scar tissue he takes care to spend a bit more time on there; when he’s done, he figures he should just go for it without over-thinking things (otherwise? High chances he’ll fuck up). He knows what Cas wants alright, but before he tentatively licks here and there, feeling Cas’s hard-on under his tongue, feeling somewhat satisfied when he feels Cas shiver; well, then let’s just do it, he thinks before taking Cas’s cock into his mouth and going straight where he should. He lets his tongue flick once under the head and from the way Cas moans he’s obviously doing this the right way. Good. It actually doesn’t feel much weird at all; maybe most of the turn-on comes from the fact that Cas is pretty much loving it (and yeah, his hands are tangled in Dean’s hair at this point and his moaning is very, very encouraging) but still. Better like this.
Dean moves his head up and down, finding a rythm he finds comfortable, still teasing that spot with his tongue and fuck if Cas saying that yes, yes, he should keep on just like this isn’t making him even more aroused. Anyway, he tries to ignore his own needs for now. It’s not what he has to pay attention to. Cas pulls on his hair tighter, says something resembling going to come even if it comes out garbled, probably because he wants to warn him, but Dean has no intention of moving an inch. He knows that it won’t take much; and yeah, it’s another flick of his tongue right there before Cas lets out a strangled moan that might be his name or might not and comes hard in Dean’s mouth, hard like someone who hasn’t gotten off in ages. Which is pretty much nonsense, but Dean knows the difference between a bunch of nameless faces and someone you give a damn about. He waits for Cas to ride out his orgasm and meanwhile he swallows it all to-the-last-drop. It tastes bitter and maybe it’s not exactly appealing, but the way Cas is shaking in pleasure underneath him and the way he’s looking at him now makes it completely worth it.
Hell, yes.
He has just half sat up when Cas’s hand reaches behind his neck and brings him down, crushing their lips together; Dean thinks that Cas is tasting himself in his fucking mouth and suddenly he finds himself so turned on that the neglect he’s giving his own erection is starting to feel painful. Still not caring for now, though. Not when Cas is all but fucking melting against him and whispering yes and missed you so-fucking-much whenever their lips aren’t touching. He takes a breath when it seems like the kissing is over, or at least he figures it is since Cas turned them over and he’s on top again. He reaches for the bag where he kept the weed which now is somewhere under the front seat and comes out with a condom and a half full bottle of lube, or at least Dean guesses it is since there’s no label whatsoever. Yeah, well, he doesn’t think that lube manufactures are in full swing, these times.
“It’s... well, all here,” Cas mutters, his cheeks still flushed, his eyes still fixed upon Dean’s and that’s the closest to old times Dean thinks they’ve been until now.
“More than enough,” Dean answers even if he doesn’t have an idea whether it is or not. But whatever, he’s set on doing this and if it isn’t enough they’ll come up with something else.
He tries not to notice how much Cas’s hand shakes as he hands him the bottle; his voice is even when he says to leave some for him, and Dean tries not to think about how fucked up it is that they’re using condoms. Shit, he’s clean and Cas is the only person in existence that should really not use condoms, but right. That Cas. This Cas not really. He nods and spreads his own legs slowly while Cas backs off a bit to give him more space. Right. Better. Still uncomfortable as fuck, but better than before.
He pours some of the lube into his fingers, careful not to waste it (seriously, not wasting lube. That’s the fucking end of days indeed), then takes a deep breath and lies against the door and spreading his legs some more. He doesn’t close his eyes even if it’s tempting; he needs to see Cas’s face as he does this. The second he touches his entrance he gasps out loud because really, totally so not familiar and it feels freaking weird, but he isn’t really the person who backs down at the first obstacle and so he just decides to go for it at once. He places his fingers near the hole again and pushes in at once, slow but steadily; he’s thankful that the finger is slippery because it half-hurts, but he goes as deep as he can before pulling out and pouring a bit more of lube on that finger and the next one. Pushing in again is easier now, the way already slick, and that’s why he manages to arrive a bit farther down. It doesn’t feel too unfamiliar anymore, even if it’s still weird. Right. He looks at Cas then, and there’s a look of something that Dean can’t decide if it’s lust, affection or what else; as Cas licks his lips, Dean takes another breath and adds a second finger, spreading his legs a bit wider. Oh, he mouths, and it feels good now even if still a bit painful because he’s stretching quite some here, but not enough to stop him really. He pulls his fingers out, pushes them in again another couple of times, feeling sweat running off his forehead and damn, his cock hurts for how freaking hard he is, but then a hand closes around his and pulls it away. He realizes that he missed the moment when Cas put that condom on him and used some of that lube for it, now it’s really almost over; well, he was kind of busy here, you know.
Then Cas leans down and kisses him with such tenderness that it aches, and Dean doesn’t think that he can take this without breaking down in apologies because that’s how it should have always been except that it isn’t, but then Cas’s hands are on his hips and Dean just hooks his legs behind Cas’s back and waits.
He doesn’t have to wait long.
It doesn’t even hurt that much. Right. It does hurt, but he did stretch himself open first and everything is as slick as it goes so he just bites his lips and nods ad Cas when he stops for one second. Cas keeps on slowly, slowly pushing before pulling and then pushing again. That second one comes easier and Dean nods again, thrusting his hips up in what he hopes is encouragement; and then Cas gives a third push and Dean feels a wave of pleasure spasming through him and the fact that his brain is supplying information (of course, you idiot, that’s your prostate, of course he’s making you see stars) gets completely overlooked when Cas smiles that half-devilish smile again and gives push number four after which they both, well, fucking lose it.
Cas speeds up and Dean meets the pace eagerly; it feels so fucking good and that’s exactly what Cas is repeating probably without even realizing it and Jesus, yeah, didn’t he think that Cas’s voice was a total turn on some time ago? Well. It fucking is. Cas is almost as hard as he was before, Dean figures his earlier show did help in that regard, and he moans in relief when Cas’s hand closes around his cock; Dean realizes that it’s slippery and yeah, probably there it goes the last of the lube, but who gives a damn. It feels good, no wait, it feels fantastic, and the way Cas is saying his name as he trails kisses all over his face is making something inside him melt. Both of them move in a way that is nothing short of frantic, Dean’s hands roaming across Cas’s shoulders while Cas keeps one on his cock and the other one on the scar on Dean’s shoulder and while nothing special happens it just feels intimate, oh-so-intimate, and dammit, Dean just hopes that for Cas this is as good as it’s for him now. It’s when Cas mutters a fuck, Dean which is definitely different in tone from everything else that he has said until now that Dean gets that he’s almost there; okay, he mouths, fuck, he adds for good measure, and then he looks up at Cas again, tries to ignore the stubble (wrong, his head screams) and concentrates on the blissful, oh-so-blissful expression tracing his features. He can’t hold it back anymore and he reaches for Cas’s face and brings him down, kisses him as he comes all over Cas’s hand hard, hard as he can’t remember coming since fucking ages, and then Cas is coming inside him too, moaning something resembling Dean’s name into his mouth and oh, yeah, this, he thinks as Cas’s hands grip his shoulders as he comes again, not as hard as before but still something indeed. Hell yes.
Dean feels fucking blissed out for a while after Cas collapses on his chest, and Dean doesn’t even try to move, or to move Cas. It feels nice, it feels good, Cas is warm and looking as blissed out as Dean feels and just, no. It’s fine. They still have some time before getting ready and whatever shit their fearless leader aka himself has planned out for them, well, it can wait. For now.
He can’t resist placing a light kiss on Cas’s temple, which is right there next to his mouth; Cas shivers again and Dean realizes that dammit, it’s chilly inside. Not that he wants to move. He so doesn’t. He waits for Cas to pull out and grab some old shirt of his from the bag of miracles. He wipes himself half-clean and passes it to Dean so that he can do the same; they dress in a silence which isn’t uncomfortable but not the soothing kind of silence either. When they’re both back in their respective clothes, Dean realizes that it isn’t exactly true and that he ended up with Cas’s green jacket underneath his blue one and that Cas ended up with his. They look the same.
What the...
“It was yours. The one you’re wearing. I guess it’s the same.”
“I gave it to you back then?”
“When my old clothes weren’t presentable anymore, yes.”
Cas’s voice is quiet, it’s obviously a nice memory and probably the first and only one he will ever share with him; it doesn’t matter, though. It’s alright as it is.
“Dean...”
“If you’re thanking me, don’t even try that. I didn’t do it because I wanted to make you a favor.”
“... right,” Cas answers, and there’s that small smile again, a recognizable one. For a second, Cas looks at the bag still under the driver’s seat, his hands twitching in his lap, a frown over his face.
“Hey. I’m not here to judge anyone. If you want to take some of that stuff, I won’t be the one complaining. Just don’t offer me anything, okay?”
“Oh, you... just... don’t... don’t ever change. Don’t ever... or try not to, at least. You know how it went, just don’t...”
“Believe me, I don’t want that. I think I know where I fucked up though.”
“Then do something. if you really want to promise shit to me, just promise you’ll do something.”
“Alright. I can do that.”
“I won’t thank you.”
“Good. Just fucking don’t. Hey, how much time we have before we need to go?”
Cas looks out of the window, then shrugs. “One hour and a half. Two at best. Why, do you want to sleep?”
“Why not.”
Cas shakes his head and shrugs, his hand going to the door. “I left the Valium at the camp. Can’t really sleep without it, you know. I’ll just get in the front and leave you the seat. You’d probably be more comfortable.”
“Don’t.”
Cas looks at him like he has just gone crazy. “What? But...”
“Y’know what? I’m sure future me isn’t one that stays after. At least since he started to become a dick.”
Cas’s eyebrow slightly raises and he looks so tired that Dean feels that lump in his throat forming again. “He isn’t. Why?”
”I guess this would be the equivalent, right?”
“It’s hardly the same thing, Dean. But I guess you just want to distance yourself, huh?”
“Something like that. I can share a backseat, you know.”
There’s that small, fond smile again and five minutes after Dean isn’t really surprised that it ended with his back against the door again while Cas is somewhat sprawled above him, even if there isn’t really anything sexual in this.
He isn’t really surprised that Valium or not Cas ended up fast asleep a minute after his head touched Dean’s shoulder.
He isn’t surprised at all when his hand cards through Cas’s hair once again and Cas all but curls into the touch and into him, all things considered. There isn’t much else he can do for now, but until he’s back where he belongs there aren't many other options.
“Well, since you can’t listen to me and you won’t stop me from saying it...” he whispers, realizing that he’s not going to get any sleep this round, “this isn’t going to fucking happen. I swear it won’t.”
He doesn’t know why he felt the need to say it, but he feels better. He feels like he owed Cas that, and fuck any pessimist attitude Cas has grown in five years or whatever. It’s not like Cas can complain, out as he is. At least now he has a resolution taken. Not much, but still. He tightens his hold around Cas’s shoulders and just waits for the sun to rise. If for a second this whole situation feels less fucked up than usual, well, he figures it’s just the proof things can be not fucked up. He’ll see that it does happen.
End.