[FIC] Lilac Wine for etcetera_kit
Gift type: Fanfic
Title: Lilac Wine
Author: nanoochka
Recipient: etcetera_kit
Rating: NC-17
Word Count: 10,100
Warnings: Heavy angst, references to (canon) character death, drug use (after fashion)
Spoilers: Up to 7.06 but with a reference to 7.09
Summary: “I made wine from the lilac tree / Put my heart in its recipe / It makes me see what I want to see / and be what I want to be / When I think more than I want to think / I do things I never should do / I drink much more than I ought to drink / Because it brings me back you...”
Author notes: This story went through many, many incarnations before settling upon this. Sorry it’s not more… cheery. Title, lyrics and inspiration taken from “Lilac Wine”, written by James Shelton and made popular by the likes of Nina Simone, Elkie Brooks and Jeff Buckley. Thanks to obstinatrix for the beta and encouragement. To etcetera_kit, I hope you like the story!
“Lilac Wine” by [redacted]
They sleep in on Sundays. Dean thinks that must be what day it is, judging by the sunlight that slants low and lazy through the shutters, bright enough for midmorning but not quite noon. Of course, it’s been years since Dean slept a wink past dawn and sometimes not even then, disinclined to fight against his body’s internal clock just for the sake of lying in bed, restless, until eight o’clock. Sundays are the one exception, though, when it’s easy to sit and watch the room turn warm and cave-like just beyond the edges of the duvet, pillows stacked up around them like a fortress wall. Dean always feels it’s his job to stand guard and protect the man sleeping next to him, but more often than not it feels like it’s the other way around.
Cas, on the other hand, is not a morning person, which is still surprising given how businesslike he is much of the time. Any effort to rouse him before ten o’clock will be met with groans and pathetic-sounding whimpers, or attempts to burrow back beneath the covers that are futile depending on Dean’s mood and level of impatience to get on with things; even today, he’s already been up to shower, shave and brush his teeth, put a pot of coffee on and set one steaming mug-cream and three sugars, gross-on the nightstand. Unfairly or not, there’ve been more than a few comparisons of Dean to a big dog impatient to go outside for its morning leak. But on Sundays Dean is perfectly content to go about his business and crawl back in bed to let Cas sleep, enjoying his face slack and relaxed, listening to his quiet snores and occasional snuffle against the pillow or the nearest available surface of Dean’s body. Sundays are just for them.
As bedrooms go, theirs isn’t much to look at, perched in the cozy loft of an old, abandoned house they bought for a song and which seems they’ve spent years restoring in between jobs. Yet Dean finds himself doing just that, staring up at exposed ceiling beams that need refinishing and the strong lines of the mahogany four-poster he salvaged from a second-hand shop at Castiel’s behest. The walls are a simple white, starkly contrasting the dark stain of the original hardwood floors Dean spent three solid weeks stripping throughout the house. At the foot of the bed there is a wall of windows, his favourite feature of the whole house, that floods the whole space with life. Quite often he can’t remember-literally can’t remember, it seems-how they got here. They aren’t people, Bobby once told him; this isn’t a life hunters are meant to have. And yet here they are, tucked away in what’s probably the most revoltingly domestic place Dean could have imagined himself, but fuck if it isn’t theirs. A life is just what they have, quiet though it is. Unconventional though it is.
With a sigh, Dean turns and finds Cas blearily watching him back, hair flattened amusingly against his skull from where it was mashed into the pillow, gaze soft and incoherent but startlingly blue as always. Unlike Dean, who is incapable of sleeping with any blankets touching his chest and shoulders, Castiel has pulled the duvet up so far that only his eyes are visible. Dean’s heart warms; he can’t help it. Is it normal to feel this overwhelmed just by looking at the same person every morning? Where does this desperation-this gratitude-come from, like something lost has been suddenly returned to him? Each morning this is something he asks himself. Cas has always been here, and yet Dean can’t shake the feeling he’s a drowning man who’s been rescued.
Not bothering to hide his smile, he crinkles his eyes at his stupid, sleepy, half-mummified lover and murmurs, “Hi.” It used to be Dean said a lot of things to Cas without ever really saying anything, accustomed to talking in silences and shadows; these days he can barely hold anything back, not even in a single word.
+
Dean found the name in the old address book Bobby kept in the inside pocket of his jean jacket-the man too much of a Luddite for even a Rolodex-and the first detail to catch Dean’s eye was the incongruousness of a name like “Captain Kirk” amidst all the other, much more normal-sounding ones like Jake Thatcher and Tom Reed and Louisa Thibbault. They were all of them hunters or otherwise useful people to know in their field, though the book itself was old enough that no small number of names were crossed out or had DECEASED scribbled in over top in red ink; a grim method of recordkeeping if Dean ever saw one. It reminded him a bit too much of his dad’s old journal. That red ink was a large part of the reason Dean’d never kept one of his own.
While primarily in alphabetical order, Dean also noticed Bobby’s contacts were more or less organized according to their area of expertise, ranging from hunters who dealt primarily in werewolves, exorcisms, vampires, you name it. At the back Dean found what he was looking for: a list dedicated entirely to individuals specializing in sorcery and witchcraft. Naturally, this section was very small, a fact Dean noted with some approval. He fucking hated witches.
The good news was that Captain Kirk was located in Omaha, a scant hour and a half drive away from their current base in Shelby, Nebraska. Although Dean had to wonder why someone who went by a fake name would keep a stable address, much less in Nebraska of all fucking places, he supposed he shouldn’t be looking for reasons to complain. Close proximity meant it was that much easier to slip out one morning with the car and an excuse that he was going to tackle a straightforward salt-and-burn on his own, needed a few hours to himself. That maybe Sam and Bobby needed some time to themselves, too, the three of them having been living even more out of each other’s pockets lately than normal.
Omaha was a bigger city than Dean was used to, less backwater than made him comfortable with a host of Leviathans out looking to take a pound out of his ass, and it took a few wrong streets and missed turns before he managed to find the place, which turned out to be not a house like he’d expected, but rather a small head shop conveniently called Captain Kirk’s. Flimsy bead curtains and bongs in every colour of the rainbow decorated the front window. For a long, frightening moment Dean was forced to consider that “witchcraft” was perhaps some kind of uninspired euphemism for “drugs”, and he’d inadvertently stumbled upon Bobby’s supplier instead of what he’d really come looking for.
Because he didn’t give a shit about their current ride beyond its ability to get him from point A to point B, Dean parked the old Dodge in a no-parking zone in front of the store-if it got towed, it’s not like he couldn’t just steal it back or hotwire a new one that didn’t perpetually smell of processed meat-and warily approached the store, flinching at the startlingly loud door chime that announced his arrival. He’d taken the night off drinking in preparation for this morning’s drive, and the interior of the shop only made him wish he hadn’t all the more, decked out with exactly the kind of obnoxious drug paraphernalia that made Dean scorn all but the most old-school of functioning potheads, the kinds who chose to advertise their proclivities not with tacky grinders or hemp clothing, but retro VW vans with interior shag carpeting and awesome half-naked warrior chicks painted on the side.
The air here was too rich with incense and there was some kind of trippy Buddhist shit playing over the speakers in the background. Dean was immediately transported to the alternate reality he’d visited five years-three, now-into the future, half-expecting to stumble across Cas in his beard and wrinkled linen pants preaching about the physicality of meditation to a group of rapt female acolytes. That was impossible, of course, the folded-up trenchcoat in the trunk of his car being ample proof. But it seemed like Dean’s whole reality these days was reduced to that feeling of aborted anticipation, of feeling like he was always just around the corner from bumping into that familiar pair of blue eyes and reliable bedhead. It was, in no small part, why he was here.
“Can I help you?”
Dean’s head jerked up at the sound of a man’s voice and jumped, again-Jesus, what was his problem today?-to find a surprisingly middle-aged fellow in a yellow tunic watching him from across the store’s front display counter. He hadn’t heard any sign of the man approaching, but nor had Dean noticed him standing there, where evidently he’d been this whole time.
“Yeah, uh,” he began, eloquently, “I’m looking for Captain Kirk?” He tried to fight back the smirk that still wanted to escape at the name, plus a few Trek jokes on the tip of his tongue that probably would have rendered the situation inappropriate. Not everything, or so Sam had been trying to impart to him practically since birth, could be improved upon with a joke. “I found this place through a mutual acquaintance and was told he might be able to help me out with something.”
“Oh yeah?” The man’s eyebrows went up and he gave Dean a quick once-over, though in stoner time it took closer to a full five seconds to complete. On the drive over Dean hadn’t dismissed the possibility he might find someone who wore too much black makeup or a ruffled shirt, anticipating a Wiccan or at least some kind of magick store; upon discovering the head shop he’d instead prepared himself for long hair and a pair of Lennon glasses. By comparison, the man was depressingly normal, dressed a bit like a hippy but otherwise just a dude who kind of looked like an unshaven Gary Oldman. “And who might your acquaintance be?”
“Bobby Singer?” Dean was annoyed to find himself falling in with that nervous tic where he turned every statement into a question. And he was nervous, he realized, hands balled into fists to prevent them from trembling. “He’s an old friend of mine.”
“You’re a hunter.” At Dean’s surprised expression, the man shrugged and stepped out from behind the counter. “I’m Captain Kirk,” he said. “I’ve known Bobby Singer a lot of years, and I know hunters; you look the type. What’s your name?”
Hesitating and fighting the urge to give into it, as was recently a force of habit under the paranoid tutelage of Frank Deveraux, Dean squared his shoulders and, thinking fuck it, said, “Dean Winchester.”
“Ah.” Captain Kirk appeared to think hard for a second, then added, “John and Mary’s boy.” He nodded and his expression softened a little in that way old contacts sometimes had at the mention of Dean’s family. “You look like your mom, kid. I knew her even before I knew your dad or Bobby. Nice girl. Smart. The Campbells used to come in here sometimes when they were in the area or needed something special.” This begged the question of just how fucking old Captain Kirk was, since he didn’t look much over forty, but Dean kept this observation to himself since it was becoming more and more clear he didn’t have the slightest fucking clue what kind of shop this actually was. Resting his lower back against the glass casing of the counter, Captain Kirk folded his arms and asked, “How’s Bobby doing? Haven’t heard from him in a while.”
Dean shrugged. “He’s doin’ okay,” he answered. “Hit a bit of a rough patch recently, but the old man’s been keeping it together a damn sight better than the rest of us. Even though he’s had a shittier run of luck than anyone.” He wondered if he should mention Bobby’s house getting blown up, but figured if Captain Kirk was really any kind of acquaintance, or better yet involved in the hunting community, he would’ve heard already. Half the contacts they’d rung up in the past couple months for sanctuary already knew the story before they opened their mouths to explain.
“Sounds like Bobby,” said the Captain with a laugh. “He never was much one for complaining, though there’s no doubt he’s more entitled to it than anyone. I was sorry to hear about your recent troubles.” He paused, watching Dean closely. “What brings you my way, Dean?”
The question, however anticipated, made Dean shift uncomfortably. None of the stories he’d rehearsed on the way over had sounded right to his ears, and with a sickening lurch of his stomach realized the only sensible option was to have out with the truth and be done with it. In his experience lies sometimes made a bigger mess of things than they were worth, and if this yahoo had made it into Bobby’s pocket book, it was probably because he knew a thing or two about discretion.
He cleared his throat. “I wasn’t really sure where else to go,” he began. “I’ve been havin’ a lot of trouble sleeping lately. Nothing I do seems to work.”
“What’ve you tried?”
Dean shrugged. “Booze, mostly.”
At that, Kirk rolled his eyes but didn’t suppress a fond smile that exasperatedly read, “Hunters.” It was all the clarification Dean needed that, while perhaps on the periphery of the hunting community, Kirk wasn’t himself a direct part of it. “I don’t suppose you came here because you were hoping for a medicinal solution.”
Shaking his head, Dean grunted. “Not really, man. If I thought smoking a bowl were the answer, I’d have tried that ages ago. Fuck, I toked up enough during my teens to know it doesn’t do much for me. And not only would we have a hard time coming by them, but pharmaceutical sleep aids ain’t exactly the smartest thing for a guy like me on the run.” The next part was harder to admit, but Dean forced it out of him like dredging mud up from the bottom of a pond. “Plus the trouble isn’t really with falling-or staying-asleep, you know? The problem is what I see once I’m there.”
“Nightmares.”
“Yeah, pretty much.” Dean gave another shake of his head, cheeks hot. “You might’ve heard from Bobby or through the grapevine that I spent some time in Hell a few years back. The nightmares were pretty bad after that, but I had my ways of coping.”
Unable to help himself, Dean thought about the number of times Cas had sent Dean into blackout mode with a touch to the forehead; even before he’d completely grown to trust the angel, Dean’d found himself calling upon him for help on nights his visions were particularly awful. The irony didn’t escape him that not only was Castiel no longer around to provide support, but in fact was the cause of the night terrors in the first place, a constant giggle loop of watching the light go out in his eyes, watching him wade out into the cool waters of a lake in Bootbock, Kansas. Heart in his throat, Dean hadn’t been able to look away from the way Castiel had spread his arms and gone to his death, Christlike and serene, and even months later it still felt like he was trying to tear his eyes away from the sight, still fighting against the impulse of everything within him to dive in after Cas as he disappeared beneath the surface. No matter how the dreams started, they always left Dean bolting awake in bed and feeling like his insides were being torn to strips beneath a demon’s blade.
Nodding, Kirk gave an understanding shrug of one shoulder and looked Dean dead in the eye. “So what is it now?”
Dean swallowed. “I keep seeing my best friend die.”
+
Cas just stares at him in response to the greeting, but Dean feels one of his feet paddle in acknowledgement, finally brushing up his leg against the grain of the hair. “What time is it?” Cas manages after a second, wary, as though the answer will determine his reply. Beneath the blanket, his voice is muffled and indistinct.
“Don’t matter,” Dean sighs back. He wriggles onto his side with difficulty and peels back the duvet so he can chuck Cas on the chin. “It’s Sunday.” When Cas does no more than scowl, Dean takes the opportunity to skooch closer and lay his palm alongside Castiel’s jaw, the other encircling the other man over the blankets so he’s effectively, if temporarily, immobilized on his stomach. Yes, he’s been awake for ages and won’t even pretend his morning wood has tried to get itself under control, but he’s got a captive audience. Besides-what the hell else is the point of sharing a bed with someone if you don’t get to beg for treats? Maybe Castiel’s dog analogy isn’t far off.
Leaning in, Dean presses the first kiss to the corner of Cas’s mouth, then another that brushes softly over his lips before he gently coaxes them apart. Despite his apparent grogginess, there’s no hesitation to how Castiel opens to Dean, ignoring morning breath and the sleep in his eyes in favour of meeting the flicker of Dean’s tongue with his own, melting into this soft caress of lips like butter. Not for the first time, Dean wants to chuckle to himself at how shamelessly easy Cas is on mornings like these, pliant and yielding in ways he so rarely is when fully awake, possessed by passion and fire and holy purpose. It’s not that Dean doesn’t love that person equally, or that he wishes Cas were more often like this, but he has to admit it’s a rather sweet surprise to feel he’s the one looking after Castiel for a change.
“That’s nice,” mumbles Cas, reading his mind, and he groans a little in appreciation as Dean tugs the blankets lower to work his lips over Castiel’s stubble-shadowed throat, the junction of neck and shoulder that pulses somnambulant warmth.
“Yeah?” answers Dean. His mouth quirks. “Nice? That what you want?”
+
God knew what kind of response Dean was expecting, but he’d kind of hoped it wouldn’t be sympathy. Training Bobby and Sam to check their pity at the door had taken weeks of sharp comebacks and exasperated eye-rolls, and even then Dean still knew there was no shortage of concerned looks and whispered conversations taking place behind his back every time he drank too much or stared too long into space, or got caught focusing a bit too intently on the trench coat in the trunk of his car when he ought to have been collecting weapons or ammunition instead. He didn’t need it from a goddamned stranger as well.
It came as a surprise, then, when Kirk’s eyes softened for a moment before he ultimately sighed. “Not to sound like a dick, Dean,” he started, “but seeing loved ones die is part and parcel of the job; you saw your momma and daddy die in front of you, spent forty years in Hell watching countless others meet their end at your own hand. I don’t doubt it was hard to see your friend go the same way, but what about him is any different than the others? What about his loss was so damaging that it brought you all the way out here to see me?”
“I think a more important question is whether or not you can help,” Dean shot back, inexplicably peevish when he knew Kirk was only speaking the truth. “I’m not gonna stand here and share my life’s story with you if you’re just going to send me away empty-handed.”
Kirk’s gaze was steely. “If that’s how you want to play it, then maybe you ought to tell me exactly what you think I can do for you. What you want.”
What he wanted? This statement required a bit more care, and Dean knew the correct answer wasn’t to go off on a tangent about how he wished Cas were alive again, how he’d have liked to go back in time and kept the dumb bastard from ever making a single deal in the first place, following in Dean’s footsteps the way he never wanted Cas to do. He wished, sometimes more than anything, he’d had the wherewithal to see what was standing in front of him before it was taken away. But none of that was remotely possible anymore, so mostly Dean just wished he could stop torturing himself with it.
He couldn’t say any of that, he realized. Instead he coughed into his hand and murmured, “I’d just like to have some good dreams for once. Or no dreams, if the former isn’t feasible. I figured something like that would be pretty beyond the reach of modern medicine.” Looking around the shop in a pointed way, Dean settled on a bong he could have sworn he’d seen in Cas’s cabin in Camp Chitaqua of the alternate future. “According to Bobby’s journal, you’ve got some expertise in witchcraft. But now I’m thinking you’re maybe just his dealer.”
Unexpectedly, Kirk snorted, an ungraceful sound that made it difficult for him to go on seeming pissed off at Dean for his earlier rudeness. “Singer? Nah. That old boot’s way too much of a square to take an interest in my side business. As for the rest, well… I keep the good stuff out of sight.” He watched Dean consideringly for another moment before gesturing vaguely towards the back of the store. “Follow me,” he said. “We can continue this conversation downstairs.”
Though the store itself was small, Dean found, as he was led to the back and down a flight of stairs, that its basement was almost twice its size and outfitted in a completely different manner. Half dungeon, half what Bobby’s library would have looked like if it’d been well-organized, the basement immediately rectified whatever uncertainties Dean might have had about Kirk’s expertise in witchcraft. Hundreds of crumbling, leather-bound books lined the walls and there were shelves upon shelves of relics and ingredients that would have made a spell-caster’s mouth water. Dean was of half a mind to make a note to swing back this way with Sam and Bobby before they left Nebraska, thinking they ought to stock up for the road just in case there were any unexpected rituals that might pop up in the near future. He also belatedly realized he was staring at a perfect replacement for Bobby’s destroyed collection of knowledge, but then again, the old hunter probably knew that.
“Not your average pothead, huh?” he said glibly, when Kirk gestured to what appeared to be a small living room set towards the rear of the basement. There were a couple of leather sofas and a low table; a coffee-maker and mugs sat atop a little bar fridge like this was just an everyday break room.
“The shop upstairs does good business, but it’s just a front,” Kirk explained. “Obviously this is my true area of expertise. I’ve been helping hunters out for a lot of years.”
“I’ll bet, if you knew my grandparents.” Dean took a seat on the couch opposite Kirk and rested his elbows on his knees. However, Kirk himself didn’t sit down. “Captain Kirk ain’t your real name, is it?”
There was a flicker of a smile. “Ironically enough, it is. Or close enough. I was a Captain in the armed forces a lifetime ago. Kirk’s my last name.” He chuckled fondly and added, “These days it sounds absurd enough that most people assume it’s an alias. Keeps ’em from digging.”
An awkward silence descended for a few moments, though Dean thought it was mostly on his end; as he shuffled and coughed into his hand and pretended to be really interested in looking around the store, Kirk simply stood and watched him until Dean was ready to talk. “So you think you can help me, or what?”
Kirk tilted his head, dark eyes pausing on Dean’s face yet again as he deliberated over his answer. “I think I can,” he said eventually. “But you never answered my question.”
+
Cas grunts, which is as good as a yes; he always pretends he doesn’t enjoy Dean’s silly, persistent affection, and Dean always pretends to give him shit for it. With that thought in mind, Dean loosens his arms from around the Castiel-shaped mound of blankets and shifts so he feels the press of Cas’s bare side against his own, the duvet swallowing them both up until he can manoeuvre himself over the other man’s back.
Straddling Castiel’s ass, all Dean can see before him is that long, tanned swoop of spine, the gorgeous breadth of shoulders and much trimmer waist that fits so nicely between Dean’s knees. The light from beneath the blanket is blush-coloured and warm, turning their skin an inviting shade of golden-pink. Unable to resist, he runs his hands down Cas’s back, skimming the smooth flesh of his sides and ending with a squeeze at the round swell of buttocks not currently being sat on. Cas squirms a little at first, like he can’t quite figure out what to do with this attention, but the movement stalls when Dean brushes a soft kiss against Castiel’s nape and quietly shushes him, asks permission.
There’s a half-empty bottle of baby oil tucked away in the bedside table, for which Dean throws off the blankets in order to reach and ignores Castiel’s little gasp of shock at the sudden shock of cold air against his skin. His fingers close around the bottle easily, gripping tight against the sheen of grease left behind from a previous use.
“Relax,” he tells Cas, fighting a smile, and grins wider at the resulting huff of annoyance. “I’d tell you you’re all tense, but we both know that’s not true after last night. Christ.” He’s still feeling it today, whether that means the twinge of tenderness when he moves or the slow burn he gets just thinking about how Cas fucked him half-unconscious with his legs in the air, holding on to Dean’s ankles with fingers that bit into bone.
“You don’t have to give me a massage,” answers Castiel with a shaky laugh as Dean clicks open the cap of the baby oil. “It’s not necessary.”
“Nah, but I want to.” He might not have Cas’s magic fingers, but Dean’s been a hunter long enough to know what feels good, knows just where the muscles and pressure points are, how to work out all the kinks and knots. The coldness of the oil makes him jump a little when it hits his skin, chilled from the cool bedroom at night, so he rubs his hands together to warm it up and get his palms nice and slick before pressing them against Castiel’s back.
Predictably, before long Cas has gone boneless and limp with pleasure, nuzzling into the pillow as he submits to Dean’s gently kneading fingers with quiet mewls of appreciation and the occasional groan when Dean works out a particularly stubborn knot. Angel or not, there’s no question Cas loves this, revels in the attention as much as being touched, cared for. Dean, too, luxuriates in the slippery slide of skin against skin, the firmness of muscle beneath his hands and the methodical process. If he rubs his erection a little against the crease of Castiel’s ass and the small of his back, well, sheer convenience is all that is. He’s just a dude, after all, and not one to insist the practice of rubbing his lover down with oil isn’t one of the sexiest things ever, especially not when Cas wriggles and gasps and purposely grinds his ass up against Dean’s balls, starting a pleasant tingle right where it’s warmest, a perfect point of heat at the base of his spine.
He’s massaging the soft dip of Cas’s lower back now, thumbs playing along the grooves of his vertebrae and the slight indentation of the dimples right above the tailbone. His hands look so broad against Castiel’s narrow waist, could almost span its width like a corset. Curiously, Dean finds his fingers slipping not only in oil but faint sweat that’s started to bead there, and damn if he doesn’t recognize the distinct flush creeping up Castiel’s shoulders and neck for what it is, the slight impatient shifting as Dean scrapes his nails experimentally over the skin.
What self-respecting man would refuse a thing like that? Moreover, what kind of guy would just leave his lover high and dry like that? Mouth ashen, Dean indulges himself another string of kisses between Cas’s shoulder blades and slithers down, down, kissing as he goes, until Cas gets the hint. His legs part so Dean’s lying more between them than on top, suddenly eye-level with an ass that’s so perfect and muscular Dean could bounce a quarter off it. And that’s okay, he thinks. It’s Sunday, and they have absolutely no plans for this or any other part of their day. Dean can improvise the shit out of this.
+
Years ago, Sam had once asked Dean the same question-just what was it about Cas that seemed to have Dean so… fascinated? He didn’t have an answer then either. Apart from his name in Bobby’s address book, Dean didn’t know Kirk from a hole in the wall, didn’t know that he could start trying to explain, to a virtual stranger, the bond he and Cas had once shared; it was difficult enough with his own brother. More than that, though, he literally didn’t know if it was possible. Dean thought it seemed a bit like trying to describe what happened to his insides when he heard Robert Plant sing the word baby-to a deaf person. Impossible. The thing between him and Cas was something that just… was.
But Kirk was clearly waiting on him, and Dean knew that if he didn’t come up with something in the next few seconds, he was going to be up the proverbial creek and out a couple gallons of gas. “Cas… meant a lot to me,” he ventured, and the words fell flat even to him. “He was the angel who pulled me out of Hell. Died for me more times than I can count, the stupid son of a bitch.” Dean felt a muscle tic in his own cheek and his voice cracked on the next part. “Even if I didn’t always show it, he was as important to me as my own flesh and blood. More than, in some cases, since I got family that didn’t do half as much for me as Cas.” Silently he added, And who I wouldn’t have done half as much for either.
Smiling enigmatically, which for Dean was a much more tolerable way of saying sadly, Kirk rounded the side of the other couch and perched upon the arm, tucking his leg beneath him. His expression screamed this was a Dr. Phil moment waiting to happen. “Dean, saying this might get me punched, but I’m really gonna go out on a limb here and suggest this Cas sounds like a lot more than a friend.” He let that sink in before adding, “In the event I’m right, it’s kind of an important detail if you want me to help. You probably don’t need telling that magick is a little on the picky side when it comes to the intentions of the spell-caster, and love is a pretty major category. Don’t tell me ‘friend’ if what you really mean is ‘lover’, because you might end up doing more harm than good when I give you the wrong solution.”
Predictably, probably even more so because he knew this was coming, Dean bristled, shoulders tensing up until something in his neck actually started to ache. Not to mention his jaw tightened enough to make a small pop. “Cas wasn’t my lover,” he ground out, staring at a point past Kirk’s stupid face.
“Then I guess I should have clarified,” came the response, “that I include in that category whether or not you wanted him to be.”
“I-”
The laugh that emerged from Kirk’s throat was brittle and a little unkind, and Dean knew this useless prevarication was not endearing him to the other man. “I hate to break it to you, kid, but I run a head shop,” Kirk pointed out with an edge of impatience. “And I’ve been around for a lot longer than you probably think, even factoring in that I knew your granddaddy when he was not much older than you are now.” Almost as a courtesy, he seemed to pause to let Dean do the math. “Trust me, it takes a lot more to shock me than hearing some tough-as-nails hunter like yourself maybe had it bad for a friend. But watching you sit here and try to pretend like everything about you isn’t screaming ‘regret’ right now, well… that’s just sad, Dean. And more than a little unfair to this angel of yours, if he felt even remotely the same way. Considering what you just told me about everything he did for you, it’s a safe bet he did.”
It was the kind of speech Dean had heard Bobby winding up to for months-years, really, if he was honest-and yet having to listen to it from someone he’d met not twenty minutes ago made Dean’s throat close up so tight he had to wonder if he wasn’t having some kind of asthma attack, or maybe an allergic reaction to the unceremonious summing-up of his whole life he’d just been handed on a platter. He wanted, so badly, to come out and deny it, but the words choked themselves back like they’d latched on to his insides and refused to let go.
Kirk was right-the impulse alone felt like a bigger betrayal than if Dean’d marched out to his car to spit on the jacket that was his last remaining token of Castiel, more despicable than if he’d carved the handprint out of the flesh of his own shoulder. Not just to Cas, either, because Dean knew better than anyone the many sleepless nights and numbed-out days he’d spent since Cas was taken away from him, necking bottles of booze like it was his new purpose in life, pretending he didn’t jump or feel his heart stop every time he heard the rustle of a bird’s wings or spied a head of messy, dark hair from across a crowd. Every time he so much as tried to speak Castiel’s name. He’d thought that coming here today said more about Dean’s feelings on the matter than he ever could, but it was painfully clear it wasn’t enough, such an unfit tribute to the memory that’d driven in him here as to be almost embarrassing. Dean was embarrassed. Denying the endless gully of regret that yawned in his gut was to ignore everything about the man he’d become in the last four years. And he couldn’t do it. But nor could he make his lips form a simple yes.
Kirk sighed, shoulders dropping. “It’s okay,” he said quietly. “I get it. You don’t have to say it out loud. But if you’re willing to let me help you in the way I think is best, then you need to nod or give me some kind of sign you understand I’m not going to play along with whatever bullshit you’re telling yourself. What I give you won’t be much use if you won’t even acknowledge it in your own head.”
That annoying tremor from before had started up again in Dean’s hands, except his time he did both himself and Kirk the favour of not trying to hide it. He let his hands shake until he had to stuff them between his thighs to control it, and when he blinked his vision went blurry and clouded with tears. It occurred to him it was the first time he’d cried about Cas when not soused or waking up from a dream, and his voice, upon trying to speak, sounded more like he’d been screaming himself hoarse for hours than it did like he’d been carrying on a normal conversation. Dean supposed that was only fair, after so many years of saying a hell of a lot of nothing on the subject.
Wavering, he began, “I just-I just want these freaking nightmares to stop. I don’t want it to be the last way I see him.”
Nodding, Kirk reached out and rested his hand upon Dean’s knee for a second. Normally the touch would have made Dean recoil, but right now it sent something through him that made his breath whoosh out in a gust of relief. “Okay. Good. I think I have something that can help.”
+
Leaning in to bite playfully at the roundest part of Castiel’s rear, Dean slides the edge of his hand down the crease to spread the oil, giving Cas a hint at what’s coming by the easy catch of his pinky finger against the furl of muscle at its centre. Not surprisingly, he’s met not by resistance but a quiet groan, then the slow, deliberate arching of Castiel’s hips as he pushes himself towards Dean’s mouth with catlike wantonness. There are pretty few circumstances under which Dean has to be asked twice to do something, and this sure as hell isn’t one of them.
Christ, but he loves eating Cas out. He hears a soft moan as he parts Castiel’s cheeks and is totally unsurprised to realize it’s him, cock twitching against the mattress at the sight of that pale strip of flesh and the darker pink hole. Lest the anticipation kill him, Dean holds him open and dives in, licking a long, slow line from taint upwards, smiling to himself at the wrecked-sounding moan that escapes from above. Dean feels more than sees that Cas has levered himself up on his elbows, and he imagines the picture he must make, lying there in a decadent sprawl of legs and his head bowed between his arms in surrender.
It’s Dean’s particular pleasure this morning to spend the greatest amount of time kissing and working at the skin of Castiel’s perineum, stubbornly refusing to move higher or lower until the other man is inchoate and bucking against him in tiny, desperate jerks. Muffled curses drift lower when Dean takes pity and circles his tongue with painful slowness around the rim of his asshole, simultaneously reaching between Cas’s legs for the stiff cock and pleasure-tight balls he hasn’t so much as touched yet. As rewards go, a toe-curling wail serves his purposes just fine; Dean pushes his tongue in deeper and starts jacking Cas off in firm, focused strokes that make the other man’s legs shake as Castiel pushes himself up almost to his knees, giving Dean more room.
He finds himself rutting against the bed like an animal, restless and uncontrolled, dick aching for something to bury itself into, be it a fist or a mouth or the tight, velvet-edged heat fluttering against his tongue, yielding with perfect sweetness as Dean releases Cas’s cock and uses his thumbs to spread him greedily wider, pushes his tongue in deep as it’ll go. When Cas harshes out, “Dean, more,” voice raw and needing, Dean has to wonder at just how fucking well Cas knows him, anyway.
But, unable to resist being just a bit of an asshole, he pulls away to ask, “More what, baby?” in what is probably the most obnoxious tone ever.
Cas just makes a high-pitched, inarticulate sound of frustration, mashing his face against the pillow and seeming like, while he doesn’t quite go as far as to thrash his head back and forth, it’s a close thing. Dean thinks he hears a few muffled curse words and then, “Just… more.” Now, years after their first meeting, Castiel’s grasp of sarcasm and play is still hazy at best; Dean often wonders if he even realizes when he’s being purposely wound up. Like Dean wouldn’t seriously be fucking him already if he weren’t deliberately laying it on thick.
“Like this?” Dean wonders, oiling up a couple fingers to slide one inside, rubbing against those hot inner walls as though what Castiel really wants right now is this delicate coaxing. He crooks one digit until the tip finds the small gland that, when massaged in just the right way, packs enough punch to make Castiel flinch and shiver and moan helplessly. “Or something else?”
Sounding exasperated and anxious in equal measure, Cas growls, “Dean, stop teasing and just fuck me, damn you.” His ability to ask nicely hasn’t improved any, neither, but Dean supposes Cas bottoms so rarely that begging for it must feel a bit like ordering off the menu in a foreign dialect. Dean would say his grasp of the language ain’t too shabby, if a bit brusque.
Withdrawing his fingers, Dean gives a parting kiss to Castiel’s lower back and rearranges the angel so he’s flat against the mattress once more, kicking his legs apart with his knees. He stretches himself out on top, draped over Cas’s back like a blanket; his cock, almost unbearably hard now and spitting pre-come, nestles comfortably between Castiel’s asscheeks like it belongs there. In a minute Dean hopes it will a lot more than just feel like it.
+
Kirk reappeared from wherever he’d disappeared to in the bowels of his shop holding a small bottle of dark purple liquid. He passed it to Dean. The bottle was the colour of old sea glass and looked several decades old, patterned with whorls and filigree like a lady’s perfume bottle, albeit closer in size to that of a beer can.
“This is lilac wine,” explained Kirk as Dean turned the bottle over in his hands. “I don’t know how familiar you are with the song, but like a lot older music it’s based on actual lore that has more or less passed into allegory in recent years. The song is about a woman who makes wine from a lilac tree in order to return a lost lover to her. There’s some stuff in there about how she puts her heart into its recipe and so on and so forth-it’s all terribly romantic and depressing.”
Dean glanced up from the dark liquid to meet Kirk’s eyes. He knew the song pretty well, having heard the Jeff Buckley version at least once or twice over the years. “This is where you tell me it’s not an allegory, right?”
“Pretty much,” Kirk agreed. “It actually comes from an old voodoo custom-couple hundred years old at least. By making wine from heart’s blood and the flowers of the lilac tree, it was theoretically possible to get back in touch with an old lover. Theoretically.”
At the thought of having someone’s heart’s blood in his hand, Dean made a sour face and held it up to the nearest light source. Sure enough, the liquid was closer to dark red than purple, and just viscous enough for him to believe Kirk wasn’t having him on. “And in practice?”
Kirk shrugged and took the bottle back from Dean, then laid a hand on top of it as though protective and wanting to shield it from the next part of their conversation. “Impossible, of course,” he said with a tinge of irony in his voice. “But those old witches found out it did have a peculiar affect on their dreams. Could make them see what they wanted to see, to borrow from the song.”
It was starting to come together, what Kirk was telling him. There’d never been any thought that Dean might come here for a solution to the deadness of Cas, but this... this was exactly what he’d asked for. That the nightmares might stop. That there might be something better, that his last remaining memory of Cas be something other than of his death. Without meaning to, Dean’s eyes fluttered shut. “So my dreams…”
“I’d say they’d be a little more palatable than the ones you’ve been having until now, yeah.” Before handing the lilac wine over, Kirk hesitated. “The only thing you have to appreciate is that none of this is real, Dean. If it’ll help you sleep better at night, then I consider my work done. But it won’t be returning anything to you that you’ve lost, understand?”
Unexpectedly, Dean felt anger flare in his belly, turning his face red from his neck up to the tips of his ears. “You don’t think I get that?” he spat.
“I think it’s sometimes difficult for the grieving process to also be an honest one,” Kirk replied. “You of all people ought to know that, having seen how your father was driven to avenge your mother’s death. Having gone to Hell yourself for your own brother.”
“What’s your point?”
Kirk reached out and closed Dean’s fingers around the small bottle and pressed it toward his chest. “Just be realistic. And don’t abuse it. A few drops before you go to sleep, and that’s it. Anything more and you might find yourself facing something less pleasant than your current nightmares.” His face went more serious. “On a practical note, I must also warn you to not under any circumstances combine this with alcohol. Think of it like mixing booze and painkillers-the effects are unpredictable and quite often deadly. Except in this case I can tell you it’ll amplify the effects of the lilac by about a million. People who have done it in the past have on occasion not woken up.”
The hair on Dean’s neck went up. “That happen a lot with this stuff?”
“It’s hard to say.” Quietly, Kirk said, “Sometimes people don’t want to.”
+
From this position his lips are right in close against Cas’s ear and Dean nuzzles gently at the helix before scraping his teeth against the fuzzy skin of the lobe. “You want this cock in you?” he murmurs. “I can feel how hot you are for it, riding my tongue like that.” Beneath him, Cas squirms, his breath thickening audibly. Dean’s not ashamed to admit he gets off on how much Cas likes his dirty talk, probably because he’s so bad at it himself and still occasionally uses words like “sodomize”. While Dean doesn’t think he’s got any kind of a future in recording porno soundtracks, he always knows what to say to get Castiel going. It doesn’t take a whole lot of effort, especially not on Sundays, which could be part of why Dean likes their weekends so much. “Want me to put it in, huh?”
At this proximity, Castiel’s earlier impatience is tempered somewhat, his voice gone scratchy and quiet. The tension in his back and shoulders still feels plenty desperate to Dean, still ready and coiled like an over-wound spring, but it’s as if the knowledge he’s about to get what he wants has given Cas an abrupt serenity and calm; like he, too, has suddenly remembered what day of the week it is. “Yes,” he whispers and cants his hips back against Dean’s cock until they both gasp. “Please now.”
Almost as cowed by the quietness of the request as he is the “please”, Dean bows his forehead against the back of Castiel’s neck and breathes out once, heavily, going up on one elbow so he can reach between them and get a hand around his dick. He’s slippery already from where Cas has been rubbing against him in that utterly indecent way of his, and the remaining oil from Dean’s fingers takes him the rest of the way to slicked up and ready to go. The natural next step is to butt the head of his cock right where it needs to be most, pressing into that pulsing heat until the muscle yields and Dean slips in up to the crown. One slow push more and he’s all the way in, gasping quietly to himself as his eyes attempt to roll back at the grasping pressure and scorching heat.
A sound breaks from Castiel’s mouth like he’s dying, back shifting to tense and arch even as Dean’s hands brace against his ribs to hold him still. He adjusts so his knees are on either side of Castiel’s, bodies lined up front to back with nothing but sweat between them, then brackets their arms neatly together so he can wrap their hands together as well. Cas squeezes his fingers almost hard enough to hurt and presses his lips to the curve of Dean’s bicep with a hint of teeth. Amidst his tiny whimpers and throaty pleas, Dean has just enough leverage in this position to start working his cock in and out, long, steady fucks of his hips. It’s slick and tight and perfect, each thrust punctuated by the hungry suck of Cas’s body in a sound so dirty-good Dean feels it in his gut, turned on by the noises their bodies make together as slapping flesh and needy groans break the morning’s silence in filthy symphony.
“Don’t stop,” Cas gasps out, rocking ineffectually up into Dean’s thrusts despite the heavy body weighing him down. This dance is so familiar to them that their hips shift and adjust in tandem, needing no direction, so every stroke hits just where it needs to be. Dean grinds against that firecracker core until he can feel Castiel shaking, limbs jerking abortively, can feel the way his muscles inside are spasming as though taken over with palsy. “Please, Dean, I’m so-so-”
“I got you, sweetheart,” Dean promises as he angles his head to bite against the stubbled jaw alongside his. Swipes a kiss as near as he can get to Castiel’s slack lips. Even the sound of his laboured breathing crackles through Dean’s nerves like fire. “Won’t ever stop. Wanna fuck you like this forever, just like this.”
Castiel grunts and makes a strangled sound somewhat resembling a laugh, heaves a rushed, “You’d better not drag this out that long.” Again Dean feels the stretch and pull of back muscles beneath his chest and realizes Cas is not joking, that he’s probably trying to find purchase enough to take him the rest of the way to orgasm. And Dean, well, as much as he’d like to see Cas come on his cock, is never one to deny him anything.
Murmuring a soft, “Hey, hey, hold your horses,” he braces Castiel about the shoulders and gently rolls them backwards so they are both lying on their sides instead. From here it’s just as easy to thrust up into the willing body in front of him, Dean splaying the fingers of his bottom hand against Castiel’s chest to hold them together as their legs slot as neatly as spoons. Cas gives a quiet sigh of relief and relaxes against him, turns his head as far as his neck will comfortably allow to give Dean access to his mouth.
The kiss seems to slow the urgency somewhat; Dean cups Castiel’s chin with his free hand and momentarily stalls his movements. It’s for the moment unhurried, soft lips catching to allow their breaths to pass back and forth for several long heartbeats until Cas captures Dean’s hand. He moves it down to his erection where it slicks against his stomach, and yeah, Dean can so get behind that, wants to send Cas to the point of delirium with pleasure from all corners. Fingers laced, they begin to jack him off together as Dean resumes the easy forward grind of his pelvis, gaining tempo at the same time Castiel begins to moan and clench his ass around Dean’s cock.
An abrupt cry surprises itself from Dean’s throat at the sudden increase in pressure and he realizes he’s a lot closer to the brink than he originally thought. Too caught up in Castiel’s own pleasure, he failed to appreciate that the burn in his belly had suddenly begun to spread like wildfire, heat that tingled up his spine and arms and legs and left him lightheaded in the rush. Hips pistoning hard enough to achieve the perfect, delicious slap upon impact with Cas’s bottom, he tightens his fingers and sends Castiel flying over the edge with a frantic stiffening of limbs and a chest-rumbling shout. After that, Dean lasts no more than four or five thrusts more before his orgasm tears out of him and blazes until his vision fizzles into white. There’s nothing else to do but grip Castiel tightly to his chest and ride it out until the world decides to right itself again.
For a while Dean does no more than breathe heavily into the crook of Cas’s neck, and enough time must pass that it prompts Castiel to wonder, drowsily, “Have you gone to sleep?” It’s possible, given that Dean’s cock has already slipped free of Castiel’s body, but ultimately he decides if he’d fallen asleep he likely wouldn’t be awake again this soon.
Instead he shakes his head mutely and releases the octopus death-grip he’s insinuated around his lover. As if on cue, Cas turns so they’re face to face; Dean notes with an amused, bleary smile that a splash of come somehow found its way up onto his cheek, but doesn’t mention it lest Castiel get the idea to rub it off into Dean’s hair or something equally belligerent. No, it’s far preferable to lean in and kiss him instead, as hard as his waning energy will allow, wrapping them together so tightly Dean hasn’t the faintest notion how they’ll separate again. Not, of course, that he’d want to.
“I love you,” Cas says quietly in implicit agreement, breathing the words against Dean’s lips. His eyelids are starting to droop and Dean knows he’s about to fall back asleep, squeeze every last bit of the laziness owed to him on this particular day of the week.
Before that can happen, there’s something he needs. “Say it again,” he answers, fingers tight around Cas’s hips. “Cas.”
“I love you.”
“Again.”
Brow creased a little in confusion, Cas nevertheless fights back a smile and does as requested. “I love you. I love you.” His voice grows softer as exhaustion and post-coital lethargy begin to do their work, but he keeps saying it until the syllables and vowels all run together and Dean’s too tired to understand what he’s saying anyway. They fall asleep like that, the words still on Castiel’s lips, but Dean can’t help but think there’s a pleasing kind of symmetry about it for some reason before he, too, drifts off.
+
A faint, “Me, too,” escaped him just as Dean jerked awake. Instead of the quiet sanctuary of a bedroom he found himself addressing an empty room. There were no windows and no light except that which escaped through a broken corner of the roof, its quality grey and negligible. With a groan, Dean sat up on the ratty sleeping bag that, these days, was doing less and less to cushion his ageing back. It was certainly no pillowtop mattress, and this was certainly no place a person should live.
Today he was taking longer than usual to distinguish his ass from his elbow, sleep hanging on like grim death; a glance at the bottle of bourbon next to his pallet made a hard lump form in his throat. Dean frantically tried to recall whether the hell he’d had anything to drink before passing out last night. There was a sharp jolt as he realized that, yes he had, remembered washing down that single remaining drop of lilac wine in the hopes he could stretch it a bit further, that the alcohol would double its effects the way Kirk warned. Very probably, Dean was lucky to have woken up at all, and immediately afterwards had to question just where was the luck in that. He shook Castiel’s last words from his ears just to remind himself they weren’t real.
The empty glass bottle lingered stubbornly in the periphery of Dean’s vision as he went about fetching a change of clothes from his duffle bag, and ultimately he snagged the bottle that was still mostly full-the bourbon-without thinking too much about what the fuck was going to happen in eighteen or so hours when he finally made it back to bed. The wine had lasted him through the better part of the month, a few drops each evening as directed, but Kirk had never had any advice to offer with regards to what happened after it was gone. Neither had he given Dean the impression there was any more where that came from.
Sam was reading alone by a sunny window when Dean made it out to the main room of the cabin, perched on top of the lone kitchen table because there weren’t any chairs. Bobby, likely, was off gathering firewood. He hoped to hell they weren’t planning to spend another minute in this godforsaken dump.
Dean made a bit more noise than necessary to let his brother know he was there. Sam looked up with an expression of some surprise on his face. “Morning,” he said, voice sounding much the same. “You slept a long time. I was starting to wonder if you were ever gonna wake up.”
That never happened, not in his life or his dreams. Dean wondered just how fucking long he had to have been out for Sam to comment on it in so blunt a way. “Yeah?” he answered gruffly. “What time is it?” He’d left his watch back in the other room and hadn’t thought to check it.
“I guess it doesn’t matter,” Sam said after a small pause, then gave a gentle laugh. It was forced, nervous-sounding the way he so often was around Dean these days, and of course he didn’t miss the way Sam’s eyes flickered down to the bottle clutched in Dean’s fist before jerking away. The smile that made Dean’s jaw clench, the I-know-something’s-broken-in-you-but-I’m-not-gonna-mention-it type smile, plastered itself back on his face. “It’s just Sunday. You can take it easy.”
“Right. Sunday.” Because he knew it’d drive Sam crazy, and also because he knew how damaged it looked, Dean raised the bourbon in a mocking toast, then took a deep, lip-smacking swig as he considered his options.
He could go back to bed, or he could concentrate on finishing the rest of this bottle until he either passed out or managed to stop thinking about how sweetly Castiel had said his name in the dream, a figment that for all Dean knew would, come nightfall, slip right on through his fingers the way everything else did. He could sit around and think about how far away his reality was from that sunny home and the impossible love in that bed. Or, Dean thought, they could just keep on like they always did, because they weren’t people, and people didn’t get to experience things like four-poster beds and lazy morning sex.
“Find Bobby,” he answered after the pause had carried on long enough. “Let’s grab our stuff and get the fuck out of here; I’m sick of looking at these damn walls and there’s bound to be a hunt somewhere close by.”
Eyebrows lifted in surprise, Sam appeared to consider his words carefully before he spoke. “Are you sure? It’s been quiet; you could enjoy the rest of the weekend, if you wanted. Recoup a bit.”
Dean grunted and made for the door before Sam could attempt to analyze the response further. “Why the fuck would I want to do that?” he shot back. Pushing his way out of the cabin, he paused outside to inhale deeply of the scent of pine and the dampness of the earth. This was what he had, he reminded himself. It was time to accept it and get on with things. Sunday was just another fucking day of the week.
Fin
Title: Lilac Wine
Author: nanoochka
Recipient: etcetera_kit
Rating: NC-17
Word Count: 10,100
Warnings: Heavy angst, references to (canon) character death, drug use (after fashion)
Spoilers: Up to 7.06 but with a reference to 7.09
Summary: “I made wine from the lilac tree / Put my heart in its recipe / It makes me see what I want to see / and be what I want to be / When I think more than I want to think / I do things I never should do / I drink much more than I ought to drink / Because it brings me back you...”
Author notes: This story went through many, many incarnations before settling upon this. Sorry it’s not more… cheery. Title, lyrics and inspiration taken from “Lilac Wine”, written by James Shelton and made popular by the likes of Nina Simone, Elkie Brooks and Jeff Buckley. Thanks to obstinatrix for the beta and encouragement. To etcetera_kit, I hope you like the story!
“Lilac Wine” by [redacted]
They sleep in on Sundays. Dean thinks that must be what day it is, judging by the sunlight that slants low and lazy through the shutters, bright enough for midmorning but not quite noon. Of course, it’s been years since Dean slept a wink past dawn and sometimes not even then, disinclined to fight against his body’s internal clock just for the sake of lying in bed, restless, until eight o’clock. Sundays are the one exception, though, when it’s easy to sit and watch the room turn warm and cave-like just beyond the edges of the duvet, pillows stacked up around them like a fortress wall. Dean always feels it’s his job to stand guard and protect the man sleeping next to him, but more often than not it feels like it’s the other way around.
Cas, on the other hand, is not a morning person, which is still surprising given how businesslike he is much of the time. Any effort to rouse him before ten o’clock will be met with groans and pathetic-sounding whimpers, or attempts to burrow back beneath the covers that are futile depending on Dean’s mood and level of impatience to get on with things; even today, he’s already been up to shower, shave and brush his teeth, put a pot of coffee on and set one steaming mug-cream and three sugars, gross-on the nightstand. Unfairly or not, there’ve been more than a few comparisons of Dean to a big dog impatient to go outside for its morning leak. But on Sundays Dean is perfectly content to go about his business and crawl back in bed to let Cas sleep, enjoying his face slack and relaxed, listening to his quiet snores and occasional snuffle against the pillow or the nearest available surface of Dean’s body. Sundays are just for them.
As bedrooms go, theirs isn’t much to look at, perched in the cozy loft of an old, abandoned house they bought for a song and which seems they’ve spent years restoring in between jobs. Yet Dean finds himself doing just that, staring up at exposed ceiling beams that need refinishing and the strong lines of the mahogany four-poster he salvaged from a second-hand shop at Castiel’s behest. The walls are a simple white, starkly contrasting the dark stain of the original hardwood floors Dean spent three solid weeks stripping throughout the house. At the foot of the bed there is a wall of windows, his favourite feature of the whole house, that floods the whole space with life. Quite often he can’t remember-literally can’t remember, it seems-how they got here. They aren’t people, Bobby once told him; this isn’t a life hunters are meant to have. And yet here they are, tucked away in what’s probably the most revoltingly domestic place Dean could have imagined himself, but fuck if it isn’t theirs. A life is just what they have, quiet though it is. Unconventional though it is.
With a sigh, Dean turns and finds Cas blearily watching him back, hair flattened amusingly against his skull from where it was mashed into the pillow, gaze soft and incoherent but startlingly blue as always. Unlike Dean, who is incapable of sleeping with any blankets touching his chest and shoulders, Castiel has pulled the duvet up so far that only his eyes are visible. Dean’s heart warms; he can’t help it. Is it normal to feel this overwhelmed just by looking at the same person every morning? Where does this desperation-this gratitude-come from, like something lost has been suddenly returned to him? Each morning this is something he asks himself. Cas has always been here, and yet Dean can’t shake the feeling he’s a drowning man who’s been rescued.
Not bothering to hide his smile, he crinkles his eyes at his stupid, sleepy, half-mummified lover and murmurs, “Hi.” It used to be Dean said a lot of things to Cas without ever really saying anything, accustomed to talking in silences and shadows; these days he can barely hold anything back, not even in a single word.
+
Dean found the name in the old address book Bobby kept in the inside pocket of his jean jacket-the man too much of a Luddite for even a Rolodex-and the first detail to catch Dean’s eye was the incongruousness of a name like “Captain Kirk” amidst all the other, much more normal-sounding ones like Jake Thatcher and Tom Reed and Louisa Thibbault. They were all of them hunters or otherwise useful people to know in their field, though the book itself was old enough that no small number of names were crossed out or had DECEASED scribbled in over top in red ink; a grim method of recordkeeping if Dean ever saw one. It reminded him a bit too much of his dad’s old journal. That red ink was a large part of the reason Dean’d never kept one of his own.
While primarily in alphabetical order, Dean also noticed Bobby’s contacts were more or less organized according to their area of expertise, ranging from hunters who dealt primarily in werewolves, exorcisms, vampires, you name it. At the back Dean found what he was looking for: a list dedicated entirely to individuals specializing in sorcery and witchcraft. Naturally, this section was very small, a fact Dean noted with some approval. He fucking hated witches.
The good news was that Captain Kirk was located in Omaha, a scant hour and a half drive away from their current base in Shelby, Nebraska. Although Dean had to wonder why someone who went by a fake name would keep a stable address, much less in Nebraska of all fucking places, he supposed he shouldn’t be looking for reasons to complain. Close proximity meant it was that much easier to slip out one morning with the car and an excuse that he was going to tackle a straightforward salt-and-burn on his own, needed a few hours to himself. That maybe Sam and Bobby needed some time to themselves, too, the three of them having been living even more out of each other’s pockets lately than normal.
Omaha was a bigger city than Dean was used to, less backwater than made him comfortable with a host of Leviathans out looking to take a pound out of his ass, and it took a few wrong streets and missed turns before he managed to find the place, which turned out to be not a house like he’d expected, but rather a small head shop conveniently called Captain Kirk’s. Flimsy bead curtains and bongs in every colour of the rainbow decorated the front window. For a long, frightening moment Dean was forced to consider that “witchcraft” was perhaps some kind of uninspired euphemism for “drugs”, and he’d inadvertently stumbled upon Bobby’s supplier instead of what he’d really come looking for.
Because he didn’t give a shit about their current ride beyond its ability to get him from point A to point B, Dean parked the old Dodge in a no-parking zone in front of the store-if it got towed, it’s not like he couldn’t just steal it back or hotwire a new one that didn’t perpetually smell of processed meat-and warily approached the store, flinching at the startlingly loud door chime that announced his arrival. He’d taken the night off drinking in preparation for this morning’s drive, and the interior of the shop only made him wish he hadn’t all the more, decked out with exactly the kind of obnoxious drug paraphernalia that made Dean scorn all but the most old-school of functioning potheads, the kinds who chose to advertise their proclivities not with tacky grinders or hemp clothing, but retro VW vans with interior shag carpeting and awesome half-naked warrior chicks painted on the side.
The air here was too rich with incense and there was some kind of trippy Buddhist shit playing over the speakers in the background. Dean was immediately transported to the alternate reality he’d visited five years-three, now-into the future, half-expecting to stumble across Cas in his beard and wrinkled linen pants preaching about the physicality of meditation to a group of rapt female acolytes. That was impossible, of course, the folded-up trenchcoat in the trunk of his car being ample proof. But it seemed like Dean’s whole reality these days was reduced to that feeling of aborted anticipation, of feeling like he was always just around the corner from bumping into that familiar pair of blue eyes and reliable bedhead. It was, in no small part, why he was here.
“Can I help you?”
Dean’s head jerked up at the sound of a man’s voice and jumped, again-Jesus, what was his problem today?-to find a surprisingly middle-aged fellow in a yellow tunic watching him from across the store’s front display counter. He hadn’t heard any sign of the man approaching, but nor had Dean noticed him standing there, where evidently he’d been this whole time.
“Yeah, uh,” he began, eloquently, “I’m looking for Captain Kirk?” He tried to fight back the smirk that still wanted to escape at the name, plus a few Trek jokes on the tip of his tongue that probably would have rendered the situation inappropriate. Not everything, or so Sam had been trying to impart to him practically since birth, could be improved upon with a joke. “I found this place through a mutual acquaintance and was told he might be able to help me out with something.”
“Oh yeah?” The man’s eyebrows went up and he gave Dean a quick once-over, though in stoner time it took closer to a full five seconds to complete. On the drive over Dean hadn’t dismissed the possibility he might find someone who wore too much black makeup or a ruffled shirt, anticipating a Wiccan or at least some kind of magick store; upon discovering the head shop he’d instead prepared himself for long hair and a pair of Lennon glasses. By comparison, the man was depressingly normal, dressed a bit like a hippy but otherwise just a dude who kind of looked like an unshaven Gary Oldman. “And who might your acquaintance be?”
“Bobby Singer?” Dean was annoyed to find himself falling in with that nervous tic where he turned every statement into a question. And he was nervous, he realized, hands balled into fists to prevent them from trembling. “He’s an old friend of mine.”
“You’re a hunter.” At Dean’s surprised expression, the man shrugged and stepped out from behind the counter. “I’m Captain Kirk,” he said. “I’ve known Bobby Singer a lot of years, and I know hunters; you look the type. What’s your name?”
Hesitating and fighting the urge to give into it, as was recently a force of habit under the paranoid tutelage of Frank Deveraux, Dean squared his shoulders and, thinking fuck it, said, “Dean Winchester.”
“Ah.” Captain Kirk appeared to think hard for a second, then added, “John and Mary’s boy.” He nodded and his expression softened a little in that way old contacts sometimes had at the mention of Dean’s family. “You look like your mom, kid. I knew her even before I knew your dad or Bobby. Nice girl. Smart. The Campbells used to come in here sometimes when they were in the area or needed something special.” This begged the question of just how fucking old Captain Kirk was, since he didn’t look much over forty, but Dean kept this observation to himself since it was becoming more and more clear he didn’t have the slightest fucking clue what kind of shop this actually was. Resting his lower back against the glass casing of the counter, Captain Kirk folded his arms and asked, “How’s Bobby doing? Haven’t heard from him in a while.”
Dean shrugged. “He’s doin’ okay,” he answered. “Hit a bit of a rough patch recently, but the old man’s been keeping it together a damn sight better than the rest of us. Even though he’s had a shittier run of luck than anyone.” He wondered if he should mention Bobby’s house getting blown up, but figured if Captain Kirk was really any kind of acquaintance, or better yet involved in the hunting community, he would’ve heard already. Half the contacts they’d rung up in the past couple months for sanctuary already knew the story before they opened their mouths to explain.
“Sounds like Bobby,” said the Captain with a laugh. “He never was much one for complaining, though there’s no doubt he’s more entitled to it than anyone. I was sorry to hear about your recent troubles.” He paused, watching Dean closely. “What brings you my way, Dean?”
The question, however anticipated, made Dean shift uncomfortably. None of the stories he’d rehearsed on the way over had sounded right to his ears, and with a sickening lurch of his stomach realized the only sensible option was to have out with the truth and be done with it. In his experience lies sometimes made a bigger mess of things than they were worth, and if this yahoo had made it into Bobby’s pocket book, it was probably because he knew a thing or two about discretion.
He cleared his throat. “I wasn’t really sure where else to go,” he began. “I’ve been havin’ a lot of trouble sleeping lately. Nothing I do seems to work.”
“What’ve you tried?”
Dean shrugged. “Booze, mostly.”
At that, Kirk rolled his eyes but didn’t suppress a fond smile that exasperatedly read, “Hunters.” It was all the clarification Dean needed that, while perhaps on the periphery of the hunting community, Kirk wasn’t himself a direct part of it. “I don’t suppose you came here because you were hoping for a medicinal solution.”
Shaking his head, Dean grunted. “Not really, man. If I thought smoking a bowl were the answer, I’d have tried that ages ago. Fuck, I toked up enough during my teens to know it doesn’t do much for me. And not only would we have a hard time coming by them, but pharmaceutical sleep aids ain’t exactly the smartest thing for a guy like me on the run.” The next part was harder to admit, but Dean forced it out of him like dredging mud up from the bottom of a pond. “Plus the trouble isn’t really with falling-or staying-asleep, you know? The problem is what I see once I’m there.”
“Nightmares.”
“Yeah, pretty much.” Dean gave another shake of his head, cheeks hot. “You might’ve heard from Bobby or through the grapevine that I spent some time in Hell a few years back. The nightmares were pretty bad after that, but I had my ways of coping.”
Unable to help himself, Dean thought about the number of times Cas had sent Dean into blackout mode with a touch to the forehead; even before he’d completely grown to trust the angel, Dean’d found himself calling upon him for help on nights his visions were particularly awful. The irony didn’t escape him that not only was Castiel no longer around to provide support, but in fact was the cause of the night terrors in the first place, a constant giggle loop of watching the light go out in his eyes, watching him wade out into the cool waters of a lake in Bootbock, Kansas. Heart in his throat, Dean hadn’t been able to look away from the way Castiel had spread his arms and gone to his death, Christlike and serene, and even months later it still felt like he was trying to tear his eyes away from the sight, still fighting against the impulse of everything within him to dive in after Cas as he disappeared beneath the surface. No matter how the dreams started, they always left Dean bolting awake in bed and feeling like his insides were being torn to strips beneath a demon’s blade.
Nodding, Kirk gave an understanding shrug of one shoulder and looked Dean dead in the eye. “So what is it now?”
Dean swallowed. “I keep seeing my best friend die.”
+
Cas just stares at him in response to the greeting, but Dean feels one of his feet paddle in acknowledgement, finally brushing up his leg against the grain of the hair. “What time is it?” Cas manages after a second, wary, as though the answer will determine his reply. Beneath the blanket, his voice is muffled and indistinct.
“Don’t matter,” Dean sighs back. He wriggles onto his side with difficulty and peels back the duvet so he can chuck Cas on the chin. “It’s Sunday.” When Cas does no more than scowl, Dean takes the opportunity to skooch closer and lay his palm alongside Castiel’s jaw, the other encircling the other man over the blankets so he’s effectively, if temporarily, immobilized on his stomach. Yes, he’s been awake for ages and won’t even pretend his morning wood has tried to get itself under control, but he’s got a captive audience. Besides-what the hell else is the point of sharing a bed with someone if you don’t get to beg for treats? Maybe Castiel’s dog analogy isn’t far off.
Leaning in, Dean presses the first kiss to the corner of Cas’s mouth, then another that brushes softly over his lips before he gently coaxes them apart. Despite his apparent grogginess, there’s no hesitation to how Castiel opens to Dean, ignoring morning breath and the sleep in his eyes in favour of meeting the flicker of Dean’s tongue with his own, melting into this soft caress of lips like butter. Not for the first time, Dean wants to chuckle to himself at how shamelessly easy Cas is on mornings like these, pliant and yielding in ways he so rarely is when fully awake, possessed by passion and fire and holy purpose. It’s not that Dean doesn’t love that person equally, or that he wishes Cas were more often like this, but he has to admit it’s a rather sweet surprise to feel he’s the one looking after Castiel for a change.
“That’s nice,” mumbles Cas, reading his mind, and he groans a little in appreciation as Dean tugs the blankets lower to work his lips over Castiel’s stubble-shadowed throat, the junction of neck and shoulder that pulses somnambulant warmth.
“Yeah?” answers Dean. His mouth quirks. “Nice? That what you want?”
+
God knew what kind of response Dean was expecting, but he’d kind of hoped it wouldn’t be sympathy. Training Bobby and Sam to check their pity at the door had taken weeks of sharp comebacks and exasperated eye-rolls, and even then Dean still knew there was no shortage of concerned looks and whispered conversations taking place behind his back every time he drank too much or stared too long into space, or got caught focusing a bit too intently on the trench coat in the trunk of his car when he ought to have been collecting weapons or ammunition instead. He didn’t need it from a goddamned stranger as well.
It came as a surprise, then, when Kirk’s eyes softened for a moment before he ultimately sighed. “Not to sound like a dick, Dean,” he started, “but seeing loved ones die is part and parcel of the job; you saw your momma and daddy die in front of you, spent forty years in Hell watching countless others meet their end at your own hand. I don’t doubt it was hard to see your friend go the same way, but what about him is any different than the others? What about his loss was so damaging that it brought you all the way out here to see me?”
“I think a more important question is whether or not you can help,” Dean shot back, inexplicably peevish when he knew Kirk was only speaking the truth. “I’m not gonna stand here and share my life’s story with you if you’re just going to send me away empty-handed.”
Kirk’s gaze was steely. “If that’s how you want to play it, then maybe you ought to tell me exactly what you think I can do for you. What you want.”
What he wanted? This statement required a bit more care, and Dean knew the correct answer wasn’t to go off on a tangent about how he wished Cas were alive again, how he’d have liked to go back in time and kept the dumb bastard from ever making a single deal in the first place, following in Dean’s footsteps the way he never wanted Cas to do. He wished, sometimes more than anything, he’d had the wherewithal to see what was standing in front of him before it was taken away. But none of that was remotely possible anymore, so mostly Dean just wished he could stop torturing himself with it.
He couldn’t say any of that, he realized. Instead he coughed into his hand and murmured, “I’d just like to have some good dreams for once. Or no dreams, if the former isn’t feasible. I figured something like that would be pretty beyond the reach of modern medicine.” Looking around the shop in a pointed way, Dean settled on a bong he could have sworn he’d seen in Cas’s cabin in Camp Chitaqua of the alternate future. “According to Bobby’s journal, you’ve got some expertise in witchcraft. But now I’m thinking you’re maybe just his dealer.”
Unexpectedly, Kirk snorted, an ungraceful sound that made it difficult for him to go on seeming pissed off at Dean for his earlier rudeness. “Singer? Nah. That old boot’s way too much of a square to take an interest in my side business. As for the rest, well… I keep the good stuff out of sight.” He watched Dean consideringly for another moment before gesturing vaguely towards the back of the store. “Follow me,” he said. “We can continue this conversation downstairs.”
Though the store itself was small, Dean found, as he was led to the back and down a flight of stairs, that its basement was almost twice its size and outfitted in a completely different manner. Half dungeon, half what Bobby’s library would have looked like if it’d been well-organized, the basement immediately rectified whatever uncertainties Dean might have had about Kirk’s expertise in witchcraft. Hundreds of crumbling, leather-bound books lined the walls and there were shelves upon shelves of relics and ingredients that would have made a spell-caster’s mouth water. Dean was of half a mind to make a note to swing back this way with Sam and Bobby before they left Nebraska, thinking they ought to stock up for the road just in case there were any unexpected rituals that might pop up in the near future. He also belatedly realized he was staring at a perfect replacement for Bobby’s destroyed collection of knowledge, but then again, the old hunter probably knew that.
“Not your average pothead, huh?” he said glibly, when Kirk gestured to what appeared to be a small living room set towards the rear of the basement. There were a couple of leather sofas and a low table; a coffee-maker and mugs sat atop a little bar fridge like this was just an everyday break room.
“The shop upstairs does good business, but it’s just a front,” Kirk explained. “Obviously this is my true area of expertise. I’ve been helping hunters out for a lot of years.”
“I’ll bet, if you knew my grandparents.” Dean took a seat on the couch opposite Kirk and rested his elbows on his knees. However, Kirk himself didn’t sit down. “Captain Kirk ain’t your real name, is it?”
There was a flicker of a smile. “Ironically enough, it is. Or close enough. I was a Captain in the armed forces a lifetime ago. Kirk’s my last name.” He chuckled fondly and added, “These days it sounds absurd enough that most people assume it’s an alias. Keeps ’em from digging.”
An awkward silence descended for a few moments, though Dean thought it was mostly on his end; as he shuffled and coughed into his hand and pretended to be really interested in looking around the store, Kirk simply stood and watched him until Dean was ready to talk. “So you think you can help me, or what?”
Kirk tilted his head, dark eyes pausing on Dean’s face yet again as he deliberated over his answer. “I think I can,” he said eventually. “But you never answered my question.”
+
Cas grunts, which is as good as a yes; he always pretends he doesn’t enjoy Dean’s silly, persistent affection, and Dean always pretends to give him shit for it. With that thought in mind, Dean loosens his arms from around the Castiel-shaped mound of blankets and shifts so he feels the press of Cas’s bare side against his own, the duvet swallowing them both up until he can manoeuvre himself over the other man’s back.
Straddling Castiel’s ass, all Dean can see before him is that long, tanned swoop of spine, the gorgeous breadth of shoulders and much trimmer waist that fits so nicely between Dean’s knees. The light from beneath the blanket is blush-coloured and warm, turning their skin an inviting shade of golden-pink. Unable to resist, he runs his hands down Cas’s back, skimming the smooth flesh of his sides and ending with a squeeze at the round swell of buttocks not currently being sat on. Cas squirms a little at first, like he can’t quite figure out what to do with this attention, but the movement stalls when Dean brushes a soft kiss against Castiel’s nape and quietly shushes him, asks permission.
There’s a half-empty bottle of baby oil tucked away in the bedside table, for which Dean throws off the blankets in order to reach and ignores Castiel’s little gasp of shock at the sudden shock of cold air against his skin. His fingers close around the bottle easily, gripping tight against the sheen of grease left behind from a previous use.
“Relax,” he tells Cas, fighting a smile, and grins wider at the resulting huff of annoyance. “I’d tell you you’re all tense, but we both know that’s not true after last night. Christ.” He’s still feeling it today, whether that means the twinge of tenderness when he moves or the slow burn he gets just thinking about how Cas fucked him half-unconscious with his legs in the air, holding on to Dean’s ankles with fingers that bit into bone.
“You don’t have to give me a massage,” answers Castiel with a shaky laugh as Dean clicks open the cap of the baby oil. “It’s not necessary.”
“Nah, but I want to.” He might not have Cas’s magic fingers, but Dean’s been a hunter long enough to know what feels good, knows just where the muscles and pressure points are, how to work out all the kinks and knots. The coldness of the oil makes him jump a little when it hits his skin, chilled from the cool bedroom at night, so he rubs his hands together to warm it up and get his palms nice and slick before pressing them against Castiel’s back.
Predictably, before long Cas has gone boneless and limp with pleasure, nuzzling into the pillow as he submits to Dean’s gently kneading fingers with quiet mewls of appreciation and the occasional groan when Dean works out a particularly stubborn knot. Angel or not, there’s no question Cas loves this, revels in the attention as much as being touched, cared for. Dean, too, luxuriates in the slippery slide of skin against skin, the firmness of muscle beneath his hands and the methodical process. If he rubs his erection a little against the crease of Castiel’s ass and the small of his back, well, sheer convenience is all that is. He’s just a dude, after all, and not one to insist the practice of rubbing his lover down with oil isn’t one of the sexiest things ever, especially not when Cas wriggles and gasps and purposely grinds his ass up against Dean’s balls, starting a pleasant tingle right where it’s warmest, a perfect point of heat at the base of his spine.
He’s massaging the soft dip of Cas’s lower back now, thumbs playing along the grooves of his vertebrae and the slight indentation of the dimples right above the tailbone. His hands look so broad against Castiel’s narrow waist, could almost span its width like a corset. Curiously, Dean finds his fingers slipping not only in oil but faint sweat that’s started to bead there, and damn if he doesn’t recognize the distinct flush creeping up Castiel’s shoulders and neck for what it is, the slight impatient shifting as Dean scrapes his nails experimentally over the skin.
What self-respecting man would refuse a thing like that? Moreover, what kind of guy would just leave his lover high and dry like that? Mouth ashen, Dean indulges himself another string of kisses between Cas’s shoulder blades and slithers down, down, kissing as he goes, until Cas gets the hint. His legs part so Dean’s lying more between them than on top, suddenly eye-level with an ass that’s so perfect and muscular Dean could bounce a quarter off it. And that’s okay, he thinks. It’s Sunday, and they have absolutely no plans for this or any other part of their day. Dean can improvise the shit out of this.
+
Years ago, Sam had once asked Dean the same question-just what was it about Cas that seemed to have Dean so… fascinated? He didn’t have an answer then either. Apart from his name in Bobby’s address book, Dean didn’t know Kirk from a hole in the wall, didn’t know that he could start trying to explain, to a virtual stranger, the bond he and Cas had once shared; it was difficult enough with his own brother. More than that, though, he literally didn’t know if it was possible. Dean thought it seemed a bit like trying to describe what happened to his insides when he heard Robert Plant sing the word baby-to a deaf person. Impossible. The thing between him and Cas was something that just… was.
But Kirk was clearly waiting on him, and Dean knew that if he didn’t come up with something in the next few seconds, he was going to be up the proverbial creek and out a couple gallons of gas. “Cas… meant a lot to me,” he ventured, and the words fell flat even to him. “He was the angel who pulled me out of Hell. Died for me more times than I can count, the stupid son of a bitch.” Dean felt a muscle tic in his own cheek and his voice cracked on the next part. “Even if I didn’t always show it, he was as important to me as my own flesh and blood. More than, in some cases, since I got family that didn’t do half as much for me as Cas.” Silently he added, And who I wouldn’t have done half as much for either.
Smiling enigmatically, which for Dean was a much more tolerable way of saying sadly, Kirk rounded the side of the other couch and perched upon the arm, tucking his leg beneath him. His expression screamed this was a Dr. Phil moment waiting to happen. “Dean, saying this might get me punched, but I’m really gonna go out on a limb here and suggest this Cas sounds like a lot more than a friend.” He let that sink in before adding, “In the event I’m right, it’s kind of an important detail if you want me to help. You probably don’t need telling that magick is a little on the picky side when it comes to the intentions of the spell-caster, and love is a pretty major category. Don’t tell me ‘friend’ if what you really mean is ‘lover’, because you might end up doing more harm than good when I give you the wrong solution.”
Predictably, probably even more so because he knew this was coming, Dean bristled, shoulders tensing up until something in his neck actually started to ache. Not to mention his jaw tightened enough to make a small pop. “Cas wasn’t my lover,” he ground out, staring at a point past Kirk’s stupid face.
“Then I guess I should have clarified,” came the response, “that I include in that category whether or not you wanted him to be.”
“I-”
The laugh that emerged from Kirk’s throat was brittle and a little unkind, and Dean knew this useless prevarication was not endearing him to the other man. “I hate to break it to you, kid, but I run a head shop,” Kirk pointed out with an edge of impatience. “And I’ve been around for a lot longer than you probably think, even factoring in that I knew your granddaddy when he was not much older than you are now.” Almost as a courtesy, he seemed to pause to let Dean do the math. “Trust me, it takes a lot more to shock me than hearing some tough-as-nails hunter like yourself maybe had it bad for a friend. But watching you sit here and try to pretend like everything about you isn’t screaming ‘regret’ right now, well… that’s just sad, Dean. And more than a little unfair to this angel of yours, if he felt even remotely the same way. Considering what you just told me about everything he did for you, it’s a safe bet he did.”
It was the kind of speech Dean had heard Bobby winding up to for months-years, really, if he was honest-and yet having to listen to it from someone he’d met not twenty minutes ago made Dean’s throat close up so tight he had to wonder if he wasn’t having some kind of asthma attack, or maybe an allergic reaction to the unceremonious summing-up of his whole life he’d just been handed on a platter. He wanted, so badly, to come out and deny it, but the words choked themselves back like they’d latched on to his insides and refused to let go.
Kirk was right-the impulse alone felt like a bigger betrayal than if Dean’d marched out to his car to spit on the jacket that was his last remaining token of Castiel, more despicable than if he’d carved the handprint out of the flesh of his own shoulder. Not just to Cas, either, because Dean knew better than anyone the many sleepless nights and numbed-out days he’d spent since Cas was taken away from him, necking bottles of booze like it was his new purpose in life, pretending he didn’t jump or feel his heart stop every time he heard the rustle of a bird’s wings or spied a head of messy, dark hair from across a crowd. Every time he so much as tried to speak Castiel’s name. He’d thought that coming here today said more about Dean’s feelings on the matter than he ever could, but it was painfully clear it wasn’t enough, such an unfit tribute to the memory that’d driven in him here as to be almost embarrassing. Dean was embarrassed. Denying the endless gully of regret that yawned in his gut was to ignore everything about the man he’d become in the last four years. And he couldn’t do it. But nor could he make his lips form a simple yes.
Kirk sighed, shoulders dropping. “It’s okay,” he said quietly. “I get it. You don’t have to say it out loud. But if you’re willing to let me help you in the way I think is best, then you need to nod or give me some kind of sign you understand I’m not going to play along with whatever bullshit you’re telling yourself. What I give you won’t be much use if you won’t even acknowledge it in your own head.”
That annoying tremor from before had started up again in Dean’s hands, except his time he did both himself and Kirk the favour of not trying to hide it. He let his hands shake until he had to stuff them between his thighs to control it, and when he blinked his vision went blurry and clouded with tears. It occurred to him it was the first time he’d cried about Cas when not soused or waking up from a dream, and his voice, upon trying to speak, sounded more like he’d been screaming himself hoarse for hours than it did like he’d been carrying on a normal conversation. Dean supposed that was only fair, after so many years of saying a hell of a lot of nothing on the subject.
Wavering, he began, “I just-I just want these freaking nightmares to stop. I don’t want it to be the last way I see him.”
Nodding, Kirk reached out and rested his hand upon Dean’s knee for a second. Normally the touch would have made Dean recoil, but right now it sent something through him that made his breath whoosh out in a gust of relief. “Okay. Good. I think I have something that can help.”
+
Leaning in to bite playfully at the roundest part of Castiel’s rear, Dean slides the edge of his hand down the crease to spread the oil, giving Cas a hint at what’s coming by the easy catch of his pinky finger against the furl of muscle at its centre. Not surprisingly, he’s met not by resistance but a quiet groan, then the slow, deliberate arching of Castiel’s hips as he pushes himself towards Dean’s mouth with catlike wantonness. There are pretty few circumstances under which Dean has to be asked twice to do something, and this sure as hell isn’t one of them.
Christ, but he loves eating Cas out. He hears a soft moan as he parts Castiel’s cheeks and is totally unsurprised to realize it’s him, cock twitching against the mattress at the sight of that pale strip of flesh and the darker pink hole. Lest the anticipation kill him, Dean holds him open and dives in, licking a long, slow line from taint upwards, smiling to himself at the wrecked-sounding moan that escapes from above. Dean feels more than sees that Cas has levered himself up on his elbows, and he imagines the picture he must make, lying there in a decadent sprawl of legs and his head bowed between his arms in surrender.
It’s Dean’s particular pleasure this morning to spend the greatest amount of time kissing and working at the skin of Castiel’s perineum, stubbornly refusing to move higher or lower until the other man is inchoate and bucking against him in tiny, desperate jerks. Muffled curses drift lower when Dean takes pity and circles his tongue with painful slowness around the rim of his asshole, simultaneously reaching between Cas’s legs for the stiff cock and pleasure-tight balls he hasn’t so much as touched yet. As rewards go, a toe-curling wail serves his purposes just fine; Dean pushes his tongue in deeper and starts jacking Cas off in firm, focused strokes that make the other man’s legs shake as Castiel pushes himself up almost to his knees, giving Dean more room.
He finds himself rutting against the bed like an animal, restless and uncontrolled, dick aching for something to bury itself into, be it a fist or a mouth or the tight, velvet-edged heat fluttering against his tongue, yielding with perfect sweetness as Dean releases Cas’s cock and uses his thumbs to spread him greedily wider, pushes his tongue in deep as it’ll go. When Cas harshes out, “Dean, more,” voice raw and needing, Dean has to wonder at just how fucking well Cas knows him, anyway.
But, unable to resist being just a bit of an asshole, he pulls away to ask, “More what, baby?” in what is probably the most obnoxious tone ever.
Cas just makes a high-pitched, inarticulate sound of frustration, mashing his face against the pillow and seeming like, while he doesn’t quite go as far as to thrash his head back and forth, it’s a close thing. Dean thinks he hears a few muffled curse words and then, “Just… more.” Now, years after their first meeting, Castiel’s grasp of sarcasm and play is still hazy at best; Dean often wonders if he even realizes when he’s being purposely wound up. Like Dean wouldn’t seriously be fucking him already if he weren’t deliberately laying it on thick.
“Like this?” Dean wonders, oiling up a couple fingers to slide one inside, rubbing against those hot inner walls as though what Castiel really wants right now is this delicate coaxing. He crooks one digit until the tip finds the small gland that, when massaged in just the right way, packs enough punch to make Castiel flinch and shiver and moan helplessly. “Or something else?”
Sounding exasperated and anxious in equal measure, Cas growls, “Dean, stop teasing and just fuck me, damn you.” His ability to ask nicely hasn’t improved any, neither, but Dean supposes Cas bottoms so rarely that begging for it must feel a bit like ordering off the menu in a foreign dialect. Dean would say his grasp of the language ain’t too shabby, if a bit brusque.
Withdrawing his fingers, Dean gives a parting kiss to Castiel’s lower back and rearranges the angel so he’s flat against the mattress once more, kicking his legs apart with his knees. He stretches himself out on top, draped over Cas’s back like a blanket; his cock, almost unbearably hard now and spitting pre-come, nestles comfortably between Castiel’s asscheeks like it belongs there. In a minute Dean hopes it will a lot more than just feel like it.
+
Kirk reappeared from wherever he’d disappeared to in the bowels of his shop holding a small bottle of dark purple liquid. He passed it to Dean. The bottle was the colour of old sea glass and looked several decades old, patterned with whorls and filigree like a lady’s perfume bottle, albeit closer in size to that of a beer can.
“This is lilac wine,” explained Kirk as Dean turned the bottle over in his hands. “I don’t know how familiar you are with the song, but like a lot older music it’s based on actual lore that has more or less passed into allegory in recent years. The song is about a woman who makes wine from a lilac tree in order to return a lost lover to her. There’s some stuff in there about how she puts her heart into its recipe and so on and so forth-it’s all terribly romantic and depressing.”
Dean glanced up from the dark liquid to meet Kirk’s eyes. He knew the song pretty well, having heard the Jeff Buckley version at least once or twice over the years. “This is where you tell me it’s not an allegory, right?”
“Pretty much,” Kirk agreed. “It actually comes from an old voodoo custom-couple hundred years old at least. By making wine from heart’s blood and the flowers of the lilac tree, it was theoretically possible to get back in touch with an old lover. Theoretically.”
At the thought of having someone’s heart’s blood in his hand, Dean made a sour face and held it up to the nearest light source. Sure enough, the liquid was closer to dark red than purple, and just viscous enough for him to believe Kirk wasn’t having him on. “And in practice?”
Kirk shrugged and took the bottle back from Dean, then laid a hand on top of it as though protective and wanting to shield it from the next part of their conversation. “Impossible, of course,” he said with a tinge of irony in his voice. “But those old witches found out it did have a peculiar affect on their dreams. Could make them see what they wanted to see, to borrow from the song.”
It was starting to come together, what Kirk was telling him. There’d never been any thought that Dean might come here for a solution to the deadness of Cas, but this... this was exactly what he’d asked for. That the nightmares might stop. That there might be something better, that his last remaining memory of Cas be something other than of his death. Without meaning to, Dean’s eyes fluttered shut. “So my dreams…”
“I’d say they’d be a little more palatable than the ones you’ve been having until now, yeah.” Before handing the lilac wine over, Kirk hesitated. “The only thing you have to appreciate is that none of this is real, Dean. If it’ll help you sleep better at night, then I consider my work done. But it won’t be returning anything to you that you’ve lost, understand?”
Unexpectedly, Dean felt anger flare in his belly, turning his face red from his neck up to the tips of his ears. “You don’t think I get that?” he spat.
“I think it’s sometimes difficult for the grieving process to also be an honest one,” Kirk replied. “You of all people ought to know that, having seen how your father was driven to avenge your mother’s death. Having gone to Hell yourself for your own brother.”
“What’s your point?”
Kirk reached out and closed Dean’s fingers around the small bottle and pressed it toward his chest. “Just be realistic. And don’t abuse it. A few drops before you go to sleep, and that’s it. Anything more and you might find yourself facing something less pleasant than your current nightmares.” His face went more serious. “On a practical note, I must also warn you to not under any circumstances combine this with alcohol. Think of it like mixing booze and painkillers-the effects are unpredictable and quite often deadly. Except in this case I can tell you it’ll amplify the effects of the lilac by about a million. People who have done it in the past have on occasion not woken up.”
The hair on Dean’s neck went up. “That happen a lot with this stuff?”
“It’s hard to say.” Quietly, Kirk said, “Sometimes people don’t want to.”
+
From this position his lips are right in close against Cas’s ear and Dean nuzzles gently at the helix before scraping his teeth against the fuzzy skin of the lobe. “You want this cock in you?” he murmurs. “I can feel how hot you are for it, riding my tongue like that.” Beneath him, Cas squirms, his breath thickening audibly. Dean’s not ashamed to admit he gets off on how much Cas likes his dirty talk, probably because he’s so bad at it himself and still occasionally uses words like “sodomize”. While Dean doesn’t think he’s got any kind of a future in recording porno soundtracks, he always knows what to say to get Castiel going. It doesn’t take a whole lot of effort, especially not on Sundays, which could be part of why Dean likes their weekends so much. “Want me to put it in, huh?”
At this proximity, Castiel’s earlier impatience is tempered somewhat, his voice gone scratchy and quiet. The tension in his back and shoulders still feels plenty desperate to Dean, still ready and coiled like an over-wound spring, but it’s as if the knowledge he’s about to get what he wants has given Cas an abrupt serenity and calm; like he, too, has suddenly remembered what day of the week it is. “Yes,” he whispers and cants his hips back against Dean’s cock until they both gasp. “Please now.”
Almost as cowed by the quietness of the request as he is the “please”, Dean bows his forehead against the back of Castiel’s neck and breathes out once, heavily, going up on one elbow so he can reach between them and get a hand around his dick. He’s slippery already from where Cas has been rubbing against him in that utterly indecent way of his, and the remaining oil from Dean’s fingers takes him the rest of the way to slicked up and ready to go. The natural next step is to butt the head of his cock right where it needs to be most, pressing into that pulsing heat until the muscle yields and Dean slips in up to the crown. One slow push more and he’s all the way in, gasping quietly to himself as his eyes attempt to roll back at the grasping pressure and scorching heat.
A sound breaks from Castiel’s mouth like he’s dying, back shifting to tense and arch even as Dean’s hands brace against his ribs to hold him still. He adjusts so his knees are on either side of Castiel’s, bodies lined up front to back with nothing but sweat between them, then brackets their arms neatly together so he can wrap their hands together as well. Cas squeezes his fingers almost hard enough to hurt and presses his lips to the curve of Dean’s bicep with a hint of teeth. Amidst his tiny whimpers and throaty pleas, Dean has just enough leverage in this position to start working his cock in and out, long, steady fucks of his hips. It’s slick and tight and perfect, each thrust punctuated by the hungry suck of Cas’s body in a sound so dirty-good Dean feels it in his gut, turned on by the noises their bodies make together as slapping flesh and needy groans break the morning’s silence in filthy symphony.
“Don’t stop,” Cas gasps out, rocking ineffectually up into Dean’s thrusts despite the heavy body weighing him down. This dance is so familiar to them that their hips shift and adjust in tandem, needing no direction, so every stroke hits just where it needs to be. Dean grinds against that firecracker core until he can feel Castiel shaking, limbs jerking abortively, can feel the way his muscles inside are spasming as though taken over with palsy. “Please, Dean, I’m so-so-”
“I got you, sweetheart,” Dean promises as he angles his head to bite against the stubbled jaw alongside his. Swipes a kiss as near as he can get to Castiel’s slack lips. Even the sound of his laboured breathing crackles through Dean’s nerves like fire. “Won’t ever stop. Wanna fuck you like this forever, just like this.”
Castiel grunts and makes a strangled sound somewhat resembling a laugh, heaves a rushed, “You’d better not drag this out that long.” Again Dean feels the stretch and pull of back muscles beneath his chest and realizes Cas is not joking, that he’s probably trying to find purchase enough to take him the rest of the way to orgasm. And Dean, well, as much as he’d like to see Cas come on his cock, is never one to deny him anything.
Murmuring a soft, “Hey, hey, hold your horses,” he braces Castiel about the shoulders and gently rolls them backwards so they are both lying on their sides instead. From here it’s just as easy to thrust up into the willing body in front of him, Dean splaying the fingers of his bottom hand against Castiel’s chest to hold them together as their legs slot as neatly as spoons. Cas gives a quiet sigh of relief and relaxes against him, turns his head as far as his neck will comfortably allow to give Dean access to his mouth.
The kiss seems to slow the urgency somewhat; Dean cups Castiel’s chin with his free hand and momentarily stalls his movements. It’s for the moment unhurried, soft lips catching to allow their breaths to pass back and forth for several long heartbeats until Cas captures Dean’s hand. He moves it down to his erection where it slicks against his stomach, and yeah, Dean can so get behind that, wants to send Cas to the point of delirium with pleasure from all corners. Fingers laced, they begin to jack him off together as Dean resumes the easy forward grind of his pelvis, gaining tempo at the same time Castiel begins to moan and clench his ass around Dean’s cock.
An abrupt cry surprises itself from Dean’s throat at the sudden increase in pressure and he realizes he’s a lot closer to the brink than he originally thought. Too caught up in Castiel’s own pleasure, he failed to appreciate that the burn in his belly had suddenly begun to spread like wildfire, heat that tingled up his spine and arms and legs and left him lightheaded in the rush. Hips pistoning hard enough to achieve the perfect, delicious slap upon impact with Cas’s bottom, he tightens his fingers and sends Castiel flying over the edge with a frantic stiffening of limbs and a chest-rumbling shout. After that, Dean lasts no more than four or five thrusts more before his orgasm tears out of him and blazes until his vision fizzles into white. There’s nothing else to do but grip Castiel tightly to his chest and ride it out until the world decides to right itself again.
For a while Dean does no more than breathe heavily into the crook of Cas’s neck, and enough time must pass that it prompts Castiel to wonder, drowsily, “Have you gone to sleep?” It’s possible, given that Dean’s cock has already slipped free of Castiel’s body, but ultimately he decides if he’d fallen asleep he likely wouldn’t be awake again this soon.
Instead he shakes his head mutely and releases the octopus death-grip he’s insinuated around his lover. As if on cue, Cas turns so they’re face to face; Dean notes with an amused, bleary smile that a splash of come somehow found its way up onto his cheek, but doesn’t mention it lest Castiel get the idea to rub it off into Dean’s hair or something equally belligerent. No, it’s far preferable to lean in and kiss him instead, as hard as his waning energy will allow, wrapping them together so tightly Dean hasn’t the faintest notion how they’ll separate again. Not, of course, that he’d want to.
“I love you,” Cas says quietly in implicit agreement, breathing the words against Dean’s lips. His eyelids are starting to droop and Dean knows he’s about to fall back asleep, squeeze every last bit of the laziness owed to him on this particular day of the week.
Before that can happen, there’s something he needs. “Say it again,” he answers, fingers tight around Cas’s hips. “Cas.”
“I love you.”
“Again.”
Brow creased a little in confusion, Cas nevertheless fights back a smile and does as requested. “I love you. I love you.” His voice grows softer as exhaustion and post-coital lethargy begin to do their work, but he keeps saying it until the syllables and vowels all run together and Dean’s too tired to understand what he’s saying anyway. They fall asleep like that, the words still on Castiel’s lips, but Dean can’t help but think there’s a pleasing kind of symmetry about it for some reason before he, too, drifts off.
+
A faint, “Me, too,” escaped him just as Dean jerked awake. Instead of the quiet sanctuary of a bedroom he found himself addressing an empty room. There were no windows and no light except that which escaped through a broken corner of the roof, its quality grey and negligible. With a groan, Dean sat up on the ratty sleeping bag that, these days, was doing less and less to cushion his ageing back. It was certainly no pillowtop mattress, and this was certainly no place a person should live.
Today he was taking longer than usual to distinguish his ass from his elbow, sleep hanging on like grim death; a glance at the bottle of bourbon next to his pallet made a hard lump form in his throat. Dean frantically tried to recall whether the hell he’d had anything to drink before passing out last night. There was a sharp jolt as he realized that, yes he had, remembered washing down that single remaining drop of lilac wine in the hopes he could stretch it a bit further, that the alcohol would double its effects the way Kirk warned. Very probably, Dean was lucky to have woken up at all, and immediately afterwards had to question just where was the luck in that. He shook Castiel’s last words from his ears just to remind himself they weren’t real.
The empty glass bottle lingered stubbornly in the periphery of Dean’s vision as he went about fetching a change of clothes from his duffle bag, and ultimately he snagged the bottle that was still mostly full-the bourbon-without thinking too much about what the fuck was going to happen in eighteen or so hours when he finally made it back to bed. The wine had lasted him through the better part of the month, a few drops each evening as directed, but Kirk had never had any advice to offer with regards to what happened after it was gone. Neither had he given Dean the impression there was any more where that came from.
Sam was reading alone by a sunny window when Dean made it out to the main room of the cabin, perched on top of the lone kitchen table because there weren’t any chairs. Bobby, likely, was off gathering firewood. He hoped to hell they weren’t planning to spend another minute in this godforsaken dump.
Dean made a bit more noise than necessary to let his brother know he was there. Sam looked up with an expression of some surprise on his face. “Morning,” he said, voice sounding much the same. “You slept a long time. I was starting to wonder if you were ever gonna wake up.”
That never happened, not in his life or his dreams. Dean wondered just how fucking long he had to have been out for Sam to comment on it in so blunt a way. “Yeah?” he answered gruffly. “What time is it?” He’d left his watch back in the other room and hadn’t thought to check it.
“I guess it doesn’t matter,” Sam said after a small pause, then gave a gentle laugh. It was forced, nervous-sounding the way he so often was around Dean these days, and of course he didn’t miss the way Sam’s eyes flickered down to the bottle clutched in Dean’s fist before jerking away. The smile that made Dean’s jaw clench, the I-know-something’s-broken-in-you-but-I’m-not-gonna-mention-it type smile, plastered itself back on his face. “It’s just Sunday. You can take it easy.”
“Right. Sunday.” Because he knew it’d drive Sam crazy, and also because he knew how damaged it looked, Dean raised the bourbon in a mocking toast, then took a deep, lip-smacking swig as he considered his options.
He could go back to bed, or he could concentrate on finishing the rest of this bottle until he either passed out or managed to stop thinking about how sweetly Castiel had said his name in the dream, a figment that for all Dean knew would, come nightfall, slip right on through his fingers the way everything else did. He could sit around and think about how far away his reality was from that sunny home and the impossible love in that bed. Or, Dean thought, they could just keep on like they always did, because they weren’t people, and people didn’t get to experience things like four-poster beds and lazy morning sex.
“Find Bobby,” he answered after the pause had carried on long enough. “Let’s grab our stuff and get the fuck out of here; I’m sick of looking at these damn walls and there’s bound to be a hunt somewhere close by.”
Eyebrows lifted in surprise, Sam appeared to consider his words carefully before he spoke. “Are you sure? It’s been quiet; you could enjoy the rest of the weekend, if you wanted. Recoup a bit.”
Dean grunted and made for the door before Sam could attempt to analyze the response further. “Why the fuck would I want to do that?” he shot back. Pushing his way out of the cabin, he paused outside to inhale deeply of the scent of pine and the dampness of the earth. This was what he had, he reminded himself. It was time to accept it and get on with things. Sunday was just another fucking day of the week.
Fin