Suggestions for a Happy Life with Your Powerful and Overprotective Significant Other (Dean/Castiel)
Title: Suggestions for a Happy Life with Your Powerful and Overprotective Significant Other
Author: exmanhater
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Dean/Castiel
Spoilers: all of season five
Warnings: none
Word count: 4,780
Summary: Being an angel's boyfriend can be tricky, okay? But Dean's determined to do his best.
A/N: Set after Our Lavish Post-Apocalyptic Lifestyle, and will probably make more sense if you read that one first. This one’s even crackier. Originally posted here
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters used in this story, and will not profit from it
1. Think about asking for help every now and then
“You are easily the most annoying person I have dealt with all week, Dean Winchester,” Castiel growls. “And considering that Jophiel and the Literal Leviticus faction played that trick on Paris fashion week yesterday and I had to spend the entire day altering people’s memories and unraveling fabric, and that tomorrow is the monthly Archangel meeting, that is really saying something.”
Okay, Dean gets the frustrated bit; it can’t be easy to make the trip from heaven to have date night with your boyfriend after a hard day at work only to find him laid up in the hospital in a full body cast. But doesn’t said full body cast get him any sympathy points?
Dean wiggles the fingers of his left hand (currently the only part of his body that happens to be moveable) at his irate-yet-still-really-hot angelic keeper and attempts to explain.
“It wasn’t supposed to happen,” he reasons loudly, once Castiel has settled into a silent glower. “One werewolf, me and Sam can handle that, no problem. It’s not like we knew it was a whole pack!” He leaves out the part where he went alone, without Sam.
This line of defense still backfires horribly.
“And what do you think a reasonable person would do upon learning it was a whole pack? Maybe a reasonable person would pick up his cell phone and use his direct line to a very powerful angel AND ASK FOR BACKUP!”
“There wasn’t time,” Dean protests as he watches Castiel pace up and down his tiny hospital room. “And - and I didn’twanttobotheryou.” He doesn’t even think about mentioning that Castiel could’ve prevented it if he’d been watching - he’d fought loud and long for the right to make his own stupid decisions without being monitored all the time by Cas and/or Sam, but maybe taking on a werewolf pack hadn’t been the best way to start making those decisions.
Castiel stops pacing and stares straight at Dean, but he can’t enjoy it like he usually does. “Did you think I wouldn’t be interested in helping?” Cas asks disbelievingly.
Dean sighs. “No, I just - you help out all the time. I wanted to maybe get through a hunt the old-fashioned way. I think I - I mean, Sam is starting to get sloppy, always depending on angelic bailouts.”
Castiel’s glare gets a little softer, which is still not really what Dean would call soft on any other person. Dean squirms inside his cast.
“I didn’t realize you felt that way,” Cas replies. “I believe I could… keep from interfering on more mundane hunts in the future, if you promise to keep from being so mind-numbingly stupid that you end up in the hospital on a regular basis.”
Dean jumps at the truce. “Done. I don’t want to end up in the hospital again.” Compromise, Dean has learned, actually is the most important thing in a relationship. “In the interest of making your trip here worth it, maybe you could speed up the healing process?” he adds, with a smirk he hopes conveys exactly what he means by ‘worth it.’
“I should make you tough it out,” Cas replies huffily, seemingly unaffected by the suggestion of their usual date night activities. “Perhaps then you’d actually learn.”
Even as he speaks, though, Castiel is moving closer to Dean with two fingers outstretched, and by the time Dean thinks to complain about the insult, the cast is gone and he can suddenly move again.
“Thanks, babe,” he says, taking advantage of his suddenly mostly-naked body and the resulting response from Castiel and launching straight into a kiss that would probably get them kicked out if anyone happened to see. Cas kisses back for a long moment with his arms tight around Dean’s waist, then shoves him gently back.
“Get dressed,” he says. “Sam has dinner waiting, and then I believe we will have time to make my trip ‘worth it’ and more.” Dean complies, but very slowly.
***
When they do get back to the motel, Dean’s hair is suspiciously messy and he suspects his face might have that glassy, just-been-kissed-within-an-inch-of-his-life euphoric look, but really, Sam has seen worse.
Sam, it turns out, is still a little pissed at Dean’s reluctance to ask for help. And, okay, possibly he’s mostly pissed at the way Dean snuck out of the motel and attempted to take care of the werewolf (singular, or so he thought) by himself. Point is, Dean’s still not sure why he got stuck with two overprotective lugs who think he’s a precious wilting flower. Halfway through the greasy burger Sam informs him he doesn’t deserve at all, they both start in again.
“I don’t know why you think you’re invincible, Dean,” Sam mutters, picking through his rabbit food. “Haven’t you been hospitalized enough for one lifetime?”
“It is reckless to believe you never need backup,” Castiel agrees. “I did make him promise to be more careful in the future,” he adds, looking at Sam intently.
Sam snorts. “Well, maybe it’ll stick when it comes from you.”
That’s about enough of that. “It’s my job to take care of you, Sammy, not the other way around. And I will be more careful.”
Sam looks like he might play the ‘you promised to be more than just my big brother’ card, which would seriously destroy the mood, but he just takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. He turns to Cas with a sneaky look that Dean doesn’t trust at all.
“You could always get Dean to do things he doesn’t want to do the traditional way,” Sam begins. Castiel quirks his head and Dean does not have any sort of that’s-so-cute reaction to that, thank you very much.
“What way is that?” Cas asks.
“Withholding sex,” Sam states with a gloating smile. Dean doesn’t have to smack him though, because Cas’s response makes them both bust out laughing.
“How would that work?” he asks with a confused squint. “I would suffer just as much as Dean in that scenario.”
“I’ll explain later,” Dean finally gets out while Sam is still snickering into his salad. “And I promise I’ll ask for help when I need it, so you two can just let it go, alright?”
They both agree and Dean smiles and settles in to enjoy his burger and Castiel’s covert hovering, which always happens after Dean’s been hurt and usually manifests itself in a mysterious never-ending supply of fries and subtle PDAs. Not that he’d ever admit he enjoys it, but luckily he doesn’t have to, because Cas understands.
2. Don’t make fun of your SO’s job unless he does first
“No, no, I’m serious, it’s a monthly Archangel Board meeting,” Dean slurs, waving his beer can in front of Sam’s face. “They vote on shit, like who has to take babysitting duty on Friday nights and who gets to come to earth and why. And Cas always has to break up these arguments about whose wings are the biggest or something like that.”
“Board meetings?” Sam laughs, taking a swig from his own beer. They’re enjoying a post-hunt drink in the motel room, kicking back like they haven’t in a while.
“Yeah, totally.” Dean’s enjoying his newfound trove of humorous angel stories, to say the least. “And then one night Cas woke up and twitched, you know, like he does when he’s getting called to heaven and then he turned to me and said ‘there’s a leak in the antechamber,’ and disappeared. Fuckin’ hilarious, man.”
“I never would have thought angels were such bureaucrats,” Sam says.
“I never would have thought heaven could get leaks,” Dean replies, almost snorting beer through his nose. “Can you imagine angel plumbing?”
They’re both too busy laughing to notice that Castiel has appeared in the room until he clears his throat loudly. Dean jumps guiltily and Sam makes the ‘dun dun duuun’ noise.
Dean claps his hand over Sam’s mouth. “Shut up, doofus!” He stands and lurches over to Cas, getting his arm around Cas’s shoulder for a nice, drunk hug.
“Hey babe,” he whispers into Cas’s neck. “Was just talking ‘bout you.”
Castiel doesn’t change his stoic expression, but he does hug Dean back, ever so slightly. With Cas, it’s all about the slightly, Dean’s brain rambles.
Sam seems to sober up a bit, and gets to his feet. “Uh, I can get another room,” he tells Cas. Dean frowns, then smiles when he realizes what that means. He pushes against Castiel, angling his hips and conveniently forgetting that Sam hasn’t left yet.
Then he blinks and finds himself on the other side of the room, along with Sam, both sitting on the edge of one of the sagging motel beds. Castiel is frowning at them, but that’s like his default expression, so Dean’s not worried. Yet.
“I think you should enjoy your night together,” Cas says. “I will see you both tomorrow when you’ve sobered up.” And then he’s gone.
“Man,” laughs Sam in a singsong voice. “You are gonna get it tomorrow!”
Dean brushes it off. “Nah, he’ll be fine,” and just like that they move on to a new drunken conversational topic, and the next thing Dean knows, it’s morning and he’s trying to peel his eyes open and figure out why there’s a rotting gym sock in his throat.
He groans and rolls over, the events of the night before rushing into his brain. Oh, god. He’s gonna get it.
Sam’s in about the same shape, and it takes them a while to get it together enough to make it to a diner down the street for a greasy hangover cure. They eat slowly in almost complete silence, and when they’re done, Sam stands and yawns.
“Uh, I’m gonna head to the library,” he says. “So you can, you know, face the music.”
Dean smiles faintly. “Wish me luck.” He watches Sam make his way down the street outside the diner window and pulls his phone out of his pocket. He sends a quick text - sober now, want to come over? - and walks back to the motel to wait.
Ten minutes later, Castiel appears. He slouches, hands in his pockets. “Did you have a good time with Sam?” he asks.
“Yeah, it was fun - wait, aren’t you mad?” Dean’s confused. Castiel doesn’t look mad, and it’s not something he usually hides.
“Why would I be mad?” Castiel moves closer and pulls Dean down onto the bed with him, leaning them against each other, and puts his arm around Dean. Normally this would be a bit too close to non-naked cuddling for Dean’s comfort, but he’s too flummoxed to notice.
“Uh, because I got drunk and told Sam your angel stories and made fun of them?”
“Oh,” Cas says. “No, I’m not mad. You didn’t mean it maliciously.”
Dean splutters a bit. “But - I - you should totally be mad at me,” he protests.
“It’s not your fault heaven seems comical,” Castiel says matter-of-factly. “If you could see it as I do, you’d realize that. You can’t perceive all the nuances, that’s all.”
Okay, Dean’s pretty sure that counts as an insult, but right now he doesn’t really care. Castiel slides his arm lower around Dean’s waist and turns in to face him.
“Besides,” he says softly. “The board meetings are nothing but wing-measuring contests. Why do you think I tell you those stories? I enjoy telling my brothers what you have to say about their idiocy.”
“You use my comebacks?” Dean asks incredulously.
“You use my stories,” Castiel replies. “I should make you save the best ones,” he continues. “That way I can tell them to Sam and Bobby myself.”
Dean’s still stuck on the angels getting an earful of Dean Winchester thing. “Am I famous in heaven?” he asks teasingly.
Cas grins slyly. “I think you could say you are infamous in heaven. The specter I invoke to strike panic into the hearts of angels.”
“Dude, I’m totally the bad boy on a motorcycle you use to make your parents nervous.” Dean’s going to enjoy telling Sam about this, but when he does, he leaves out the part where Cas makes a bad pun about bad boys which leads to nakedness.
Some things are private.
3. Don’t forget about your other relationships
It takes approximately two days for Dean to catch on. Sam’s always been kind of whiny, though, and it might’ve taken longer if Castiel hadn’t declared a heaven-wide holiday (under duress, but trying to teach angels about free will led to such things) that apparently lasted for two whole earth weeks and required his presence for the entire time since ‘my absence could result in chaos, Dean’ and ‘I suspect Liraphael may use the commotion to try and break Michael and Lucifer out of hell,’ which, what did he expect, making himself indispensable like that? Not that Dean was bitter.
Anyway, Sam’s been moping extra hard and when Dean finally figures it out, Sam’s on his way to an Olympic gold medal in annoying little brother behavior. After having to go out and get his own dinner for the second day in a row because Sam ‘forgot’ and not being able to take a shower because Sam’s used all the hot water, Dean realizes it’s not just sharing a room for the first time in a while that has Sam acting up and decides it’s time to fix whatever’s wrong. He doesn’t dwell on the fact that he’s the one initiating a serious conversation - stability changes a guy, okay?
Sam’s sighing loudly every so often and messing around on his laptop over on his bed, and Dean refrains from making a thirteen-year-old girl joke, but only just.
“Hey Sammy,” he starts, throwing a lumpy motel pillow across the room at his brother’s head. It lands softly, but Sam still jumps.
“Jesus, Dean!” he yells. “What do you want?”
“Just to spend some time with my only brother. What’s on your enormous mind?”
Sam sighs again. “Nothing.”
“C’mon, tell me. Is it a girl? Did you meet a girl and have no idea how to ask her out?”
Sam frowns and looks scarily close to pouting. “No. Shut up.”
“Man, I’m asking about your feelings, here,” Dean says. “Might want to take advantage of this one time offer.”
“I guess I’m just surprised you can shut up about Castiel long enough to realize I’m even alive,” Sam spits out finally.
Okay, that definitely is not what Dean expected to hear. It kind of cracks him up, though he can see that Sam is serious. “Are you jealous? Of Cas? Really?”
Sam turns blotchy-red and looks two seconds away from stuffing his face in his pillow, a look Dean knows well, though he hasn’t seen it in about fifteen years.
“No,” Sam says. “Not really, I’m just tired and I guess - I guess I just never thought you’d be settled down before me. I’m used to being better at relationships than you, and now I can’t even manage to ask a girl out on a date. And dude, you do talk about him pretty much all the time.” He runs his hand through his messy hair and looks up at Dean with a half-assed smile.
Dean isn’t remotely qualified to counsel anyone about relationships, and being better at them than Sam, currently, isn’t saying all that much. On the other hand, he’s been an expert at handling a moping Sam all his life. He stands and claps his hands together.
“Okay, c’mon, let’s go.” Dean prods Sam’s waist with his foot, pushing him up and off the bed.
“Go where?” Sam whines. “I’m not up for a big night on the town.”
“We’re gonna do your favorite things,” Dean replies. “First we’ll get a wimpy little after-dinner snack at some diva cafe, then we’ll get drunk at a wine bar and I’ll let you lecture me about my bad habits until you pass out, it’ll be great.”
Sam looks intrigued and distrustful. “The cafe with the cheesecake?”
“The one with the cheesecake, now get off your ass.”
***
Two hours later, Dean’s plan is a success and he wishes he had cut Sam off after two bottles.
“Do you know how loud you are?” Sam’s a happy drunk tonight, sweeping his arms to encompass the whole room as he tells everyone about Dean’s sex life. “I had to get another room last week because I could hear the headboard thumping from two floors away, Dean. Two floors!”
Dean is tipsy enough to not blush, but it’s a near thing. “Will you shut up about my love life?” he hisses.
“Awww,” Sam practically yells. “My big brother finally fell in love! I’m just - I’m just really happy for you, even if I never want to hear you say Castiel’s name like that again.”
See, this is why Dean doesn’t let Sam drag him into wine bars. But at least Sam’s not sad anymore, and Dean considers the whole ordeal worth it when Sam’s reaction to Castiel’s return is to clap him on the back with a huge paw and say “welcome to the family.”
Well, he also says “guess it’s time for me to switch motels, you two have a fun night,” as he winks at Cas, but Dean’s letting that go for now.
4. Don’t panic. No, seriously, don’t panic.
It’s three days later when Dean suddenly has his long-awaited gay relationship freakout. It’s not a gay freakout, really, because he’s long since accepted that he’s not all the way straight. After spending forty years in hell and then living through an apocalypse, he can put things into perspective. In the big picture, liking the feel of stubble and the fact that Cas can hold him down with one hand isn’t anything to be worried about, and if he’s being exceptionally honest, he’ll acknowledge that even before hell, he’d thought about it.
So maybe it’s more of a relationship freakout, period.
Castiel had spent the night, and when Dean woke up in a familiar warm sprawl all over Cas’s chest and thought I want to wake up like this every day for the rest of my life, he’d barely finished thinking it before panic set in and he practically ran to the shower. He’d washed and gotten dressed before Castiel could even think about joining him, and when Dean made up a particularly transparent excuse about shopping for supplies and didn’t Cas need to get back to heaven already, Cas had just blanked his face of any expression and disappeared.
The next night Cas comes back as usual and shows no sign that he knows Dean’s acting strangely. Dean’s flipping frantically through a skinmag at the exact moment Cas shows up in an attempt to convince himself that he misses boobs, and Castiel doesn’t even mention it, just says hello and drags Dean out to dinner in a bar, despite Dean’s best efforts at derailing the whole visit into a sex marathon.
At the bar, once their food and beers have been ordered, Dean commandeers a pool table and eyes up a couple of blondes who quickly ask if they can play.
Castiel watches as Dean gathers a crowd, men and women looking on as he shoots pool and flirts with anyone who looks at him more than once. He knows he’s doing it, knows the train wreck he’s asking for, but he can’t stop. Even when his burger arrives, he doesn’t go back to the booth where Cas is waiting silently, just balances the plate on the corner of the pool table and takes occasional bites. The first blonde gives him a look eventually, then turns to the corner where Cas sits.
“You gonna get in trouble for playing with us?” she asks Dean.
He gives her a slow smile. “Nah, he likes to watch,” he says. He feels like it’s not him talking, like he’s seeing things from a distance, unable to stop himself.
“Doesn’t look like it,” she replies, gesturing behind Dean, who only has a second to turn before he feels Castiel’s hands on his shoulders.
“Excuse us,” Cas tells the woman, not unkindly. He pushes Dean along in front of him and Dean can feel his glare burning a hole in the back of his head as Dean grabs his beer from a table on the way.
“Of course,” Castiel exclaims once he’s shoved Dean back into their booth, less upset than Dean thought he’d looked earlier. “I thought you might be trying to make me angry for some reason, but you’re just having your commitment crisis. I should have noticed sooner.”
“What?” Dean sputters gracelessly, beer spraying all over the table in an epic spit-take.
Cas shakes his head fondly. “Your crisis, the stage of our relationship where you desperately try to convince yourself that you are still attracted to random women and that you don’t want to be stuck with one partner for the foreseeable future, in order to cover your feelings of inadequacy and your fear that you’ll screw everything up and bring nothing but pain to those who love you.”
That’s - that’s scarily accurate, Dean is horrified to admit. “Who - I mean - what - how do you know all that?”
Cas frowns. “Sam was very clear about the symptoms. I’m sure that’s what you’re experiencing.” Cas looks deep in thought for a moment, then fixes his deadly serious stare on Dean, who reacts predictably by feeling equal parts nervous and turned on. He stays still as Cas reaches out to touch his forehead and then he’s sitting on the motel bed as Cas kneels in front of him.
Cas keeps his gaze firmly on Dean for a long, long moment, before breaking it to shake his head and sigh, sounding heavily put upon.
“I know it’s not entirely your fault,” Cas growls, and Dean shivers. “But you are the most emotionally wrecked human being I have ever seen, including the young girl with the absentee postal worker father at the brothel you took me to, and she didn’t even have a brother who loved her.”
Cas pulls Dean’s face toward his own. “I am going to tell you this once, and I expect you to listen. I chose you, Dean. I will not change my mind, and I know my choice is the right one.”
Dean’s trying hard to keep his eyes open, focusing on Castiel’s throat, the sliver of skin visible behind his loose collar, but all he wants to do is close them and lean in to kiss Castiel senseless. Cas can see his intention and keeps him at an arms-length, gripping his shoulders.
“Do you understand?” It’s an order, not a question.
Dean nods, then gasps, “yes, Cas, c’mon,” reaching for Cas’s waist and surging up into the kiss as Cas pushes him back on the bed and covers him with his body.
He spends the rest of the night trying to show Cas how much he means it, how well he understands.
***
A few days later, after Cas manages to spill the whole embarrassing ordeal in the bar to Sam, the teasing starts. Sam and Dean are lounging in Bobby’s living room watching tv and snacking on chips and beer while Bobby cleans his guns in the dining room. Cas is away on angel business.
“Couldn’t you have had your crisis a little earlier?” Sam asks during a commercial.
Dean isn’t suspicious at first, which just goes to show how relaxed he is now that everything’s back to normal. “It wasn’t a crisis, Sammy, it was character-building.”
“I almost won the pool!” Sam says. “Two weeks sooner and I could’ve finally gotten a new laptop without feeling guilty.”
Dean turns his head sharply. “Pool?” he asks, practically growling.
Bobby hears and yells from the dining room. “I nailed it! Seven months in, on the dot!”
That is absolutely it. “Sam,” Dean starts calmly. “Did you have a bet with Bobby about the timing of my not-actually-a-crisis gay crisis?” By the end of the sentence his voice has gotten fairly shrill, and much, much louder.
Sam barely registers the words over his own laughter. He’s shaking on the couch and wheezing for breath, and the sight is enough to deflate Dean’s indignation. Bobby comes in and leans against the wall next to the couch, shaking his head, and that’s when Dean realizes he’s laughing too, leaning against Sam’s shoulder with tears in his eyes.
Sam’s snorting through his nose. “Not actually-a-crisis gay crisis?” he sputters, hands flailing into Dean’s face.
“Yeah, yeah,” Dean replies, getting control over his laughter. “You owe me half of that pot, Bobby.”
“Like hell I do, boy,” Bobby grunts. “Make your own damn bets.”
Sam stops rolling all over the place and nudges Dean with his shoulder. “You’re such a jerk, Dean.”
“Bitch,” Dean replies happily. Yeah, things are back to normal.
5. It’s okay to think about the future
Life runs along smoothly for a while, or as smoothly as it can go when it involves tracking down monsters and evading the IRS. Good hunts are getting a little hard to find, since demonic activity is at a low Dean hasn’t seen in his lifetime before, and sometimes they arrive at the scene of a haunting to find that other hunters have beaten them to the punch.
At first it’s nice to have a break, but Dean gets restless and Sam starts looking up colleges and forgetting to clear his browser history, which is how Dean knows about it. He braces himself for change, like he’s been doing daily since Sam came back, but Sam doesn’t make a move until it's been two years since the apocalypse.
They’re at Bobby’s, Dean helping with car repairs and Sam hanging around the library, taking a break from motels. Castiel comes for dinner most nights, and 1950’s housewife jokes aside, Dean likes the regularity of working on cars all day and then making dinner for his little makeshift family.
One night as Sam is cleaning up and Cas and Dean are lounging at the table, watching him, Sam drops the bomb.
“So, I’m thinking maybe I could go back to school?” he says, trying to be nonchalant but mostly just sounding scared.
“Oh yeah?” Dean replies. “What school? I’m thinking the east coast probably has a place we could agree on, somewhere with a garage I could work at, when I’m not enjoying my life as a kept man.”
Sam turns away from the sink and stares. Castiel’s eyes move from Dean to Sam and back again and Dean thinks he must be enjoying the show.
“You’re not going to try and stop me?” Sam asks. “Keep me in the family business? Refuse to come along, and sever all contact?”
“Well, you may not have noticed, but I’m getting kind of old,” Dean replies, shrugging his shoulders. “Still hot as hell, but kinda old. I could do with a break from getting slammed into walls.” He sneaks a look at Cas and adds, “and I could use a regular bed.”
“I guess this means my prepared lecture about the merits of a college town hunting base is useless,” Sam sighs.
“You didn’t - ” Dean starts, then stops. Who knows? Maybe Sam was that prepared.
“No, of course not,” Sam scoffs, twisting his hands together. “But - you’re really okay with that?”
Dean surreptitiously plays footsie with Cas under the table and smiles. “Yeah, Sam, let’s be real boys for a while.”
***
Later that night, alone in the guestroom with Cas, Dean realizes that this is it, this is the rest of his life, and he’s happy about it. He shifts in the bed and looks at Cas, who’s been watching him doze, the creeper.
“You sure you want to do this?” Dean asks. “Stick around here with the mud monkeys and watch me make an ass of myself, and get crap from all the other angels about slumming it?”
Cas moves a hand lazily up and down Dean’s side, scratching lightly with his nails. “I believe I’ve made my feelings about you perfectly clear. I am where are I want to be. Are you?”
“I am, you know I am, but - what about when I’m old? What happens when I die?” Dean wants to shoot himself in the face once he hears what he’s saying, but it’s out, no helping it now.
“We will handle that when the time comes,” Cas says, and Dean wants to believe him.
“After all,” Cas finishes. “I am kind of a big deal in heaven.”
Dean doesn’t argue anymore.
The end
ETA: short sequel
Author: exmanhater
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Dean/Castiel
Spoilers: all of season five
Warnings: none
Word count: 4,780
Summary: Being an angel's boyfriend can be tricky, okay? But Dean's determined to do his best.
A/N: Set after Our Lavish Post-Apocalyptic Lifestyle, and will probably make more sense if you read that one first. This one’s even crackier. Originally posted here
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters used in this story, and will not profit from it
1. Think about asking for help every now and then
“You are easily the most annoying person I have dealt with all week, Dean Winchester,” Castiel growls. “And considering that Jophiel and the Literal Leviticus faction played that trick on Paris fashion week yesterday and I had to spend the entire day altering people’s memories and unraveling fabric, and that tomorrow is the monthly Archangel meeting, that is really saying something.”
Okay, Dean gets the frustrated bit; it can’t be easy to make the trip from heaven to have date night with your boyfriend after a hard day at work only to find him laid up in the hospital in a full body cast. But doesn’t said full body cast get him any sympathy points?
Dean wiggles the fingers of his left hand (currently the only part of his body that happens to be moveable) at his irate-yet-still-really-hot angelic keeper and attempts to explain.
“It wasn’t supposed to happen,” he reasons loudly, once Castiel has settled into a silent glower. “One werewolf, me and Sam can handle that, no problem. It’s not like we knew it was a whole pack!” He leaves out the part where he went alone, without Sam.
This line of defense still backfires horribly.
“And what do you think a reasonable person would do upon learning it was a whole pack? Maybe a reasonable person would pick up his cell phone and use his direct line to a very powerful angel AND ASK FOR BACKUP!”
“There wasn’t time,” Dean protests as he watches Castiel pace up and down his tiny hospital room. “And - and I didn’twanttobotheryou.” He doesn’t even think about mentioning that Castiel could’ve prevented it if he’d been watching - he’d fought loud and long for the right to make his own stupid decisions without being monitored all the time by Cas and/or Sam, but maybe taking on a werewolf pack hadn’t been the best way to start making those decisions.
Castiel stops pacing and stares straight at Dean, but he can’t enjoy it like he usually does. “Did you think I wouldn’t be interested in helping?” Cas asks disbelievingly.
Dean sighs. “No, I just - you help out all the time. I wanted to maybe get through a hunt the old-fashioned way. I think I - I mean, Sam is starting to get sloppy, always depending on angelic bailouts.”
Castiel’s glare gets a little softer, which is still not really what Dean would call soft on any other person. Dean squirms inside his cast.
“I didn’t realize you felt that way,” Cas replies. “I believe I could… keep from interfering on more mundane hunts in the future, if you promise to keep from being so mind-numbingly stupid that you end up in the hospital on a regular basis.”
Dean jumps at the truce. “Done. I don’t want to end up in the hospital again.” Compromise, Dean has learned, actually is the most important thing in a relationship. “In the interest of making your trip here worth it, maybe you could speed up the healing process?” he adds, with a smirk he hopes conveys exactly what he means by ‘worth it.’
“I should make you tough it out,” Cas replies huffily, seemingly unaffected by the suggestion of their usual date night activities. “Perhaps then you’d actually learn.”
Even as he speaks, though, Castiel is moving closer to Dean with two fingers outstretched, and by the time Dean thinks to complain about the insult, the cast is gone and he can suddenly move again.
“Thanks, babe,” he says, taking advantage of his suddenly mostly-naked body and the resulting response from Castiel and launching straight into a kiss that would probably get them kicked out if anyone happened to see. Cas kisses back for a long moment with his arms tight around Dean’s waist, then shoves him gently back.
“Get dressed,” he says. “Sam has dinner waiting, and then I believe we will have time to make my trip ‘worth it’ and more.” Dean complies, but very slowly.
***
When they do get back to the motel, Dean’s hair is suspiciously messy and he suspects his face might have that glassy, just-been-kissed-within-an-inch-of-his-life euphoric look, but really, Sam has seen worse.
Sam, it turns out, is still a little pissed at Dean’s reluctance to ask for help. And, okay, possibly he’s mostly pissed at the way Dean snuck out of the motel and attempted to take care of the werewolf (singular, or so he thought) by himself. Point is, Dean’s still not sure why he got stuck with two overprotective lugs who think he’s a precious wilting flower. Halfway through the greasy burger Sam informs him he doesn’t deserve at all, they both start in again.
“I don’t know why you think you’re invincible, Dean,” Sam mutters, picking through his rabbit food. “Haven’t you been hospitalized enough for one lifetime?”
“It is reckless to believe you never need backup,” Castiel agrees. “I did make him promise to be more careful in the future,” he adds, looking at Sam intently.
Sam snorts. “Well, maybe it’ll stick when it comes from you.”
That’s about enough of that. “It’s my job to take care of you, Sammy, not the other way around. And I will be more careful.”
Sam looks like he might play the ‘you promised to be more than just my big brother’ card, which would seriously destroy the mood, but he just takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. He turns to Cas with a sneaky look that Dean doesn’t trust at all.
“You could always get Dean to do things he doesn’t want to do the traditional way,” Sam begins. Castiel quirks his head and Dean does not have any sort of that’s-so-cute reaction to that, thank you very much.
“What way is that?” Cas asks.
“Withholding sex,” Sam states with a gloating smile. Dean doesn’t have to smack him though, because Cas’s response makes them both bust out laughing.
“How would that work?” he asks with a confused squint. “I would suffer just as much as Dean in that scenario.”
“I’ll explain later,” Dean finally gets out while Sam is still snickering into his salad. “And I promise I’ll ask for help when I need it, so you two can just let it go, alright?”
They both agree and Dean smiles and settles in to enjoy his burger and Castiel’s covert hovering, which always happens after Dean’s been hurt and usually manifests itself in a mysterious never-ending supply of fries and subtle PDAs. Not that he’d ever admit he enjoys it, but luckily he doesn’t have to, because Cas understands.
2. Don’t make fun of your SO’s job unless he does first
“No, no, I’m serious, it’s a monthly Archangel Board meeting,” Dean slurs, waving his beer can in front of Sam’s face. “They vote on shit, like who has to take babysitting duty on Friday nights and who gets to come to earth and why. And Cas always has to break up these arguments about whose wings are the biggest or something like that.”
“Board meetings?” Sam laughs, taking a swig from his own beer. They’re enjoying a post-hunt drink in the motel room, kicking back like they haven’t in a while.
“Yeah, totally.” Dean’s enjoying his newfound trove of humorous angel stories, to say the least. “And then one night Cas woke up and twitched, you know, like he does when he’s getting called to heaven and then he turned to me and said ‘there’s a leak in the antechamber,’ and disappeared. Fuckin’ hilarious, man.”
“I never would have thought angels were such bureaucrats,” Sam says.
“I never would have thought heaven could get leaks,” Dean replies, almost snorting beer through his nose. “Can you imagine angel plumbing?”
They’re both too busy laughing to notice that Castiel has appeared in the room until he clears his throat loudly. Dean jumps guiltily and Sam makes the ‘dun dun duuun’ noise.
Dean claps his hand over Sam’s mouth. “Shut up, doofus!” He stands and lurches over to Cas, getting his arm around Cas’s shoulder for a nice, drunk hug.
“Hey babe,” he whispers into Cas’s neck. “Was just talking ‘bout you.”
Castiel doesn’t change his stoic expression, but he does hug Dean back, ever so slightly. With Cas, it’s all about the slightly, Dean’s brain rambles.
Sam seems to sober up a bit, and gets to his feet. “Uh, I can get another room,” he tells Cas. Dean frowns, then smiles when he realizes what that means. He pushes against Castiel, angling his hips and conveniently forgetting that Sam hasn’t left yet.
Then he blinks and finds himself on the other side of the room, along with Sam, both sitting on the edge of one of the sagging motel beds. Castiel is frowning at them, but that’s like his default expression, so Dean’s not worried. Yet.
“I think you should enjoy your night together,” Cas says. “I will see you both tomorrow when you’ve sobered up.” And then he’s gone.
“Man,” laughs Sam in a singsong voice. “You are gonna get it tomorrow!”
Dean brushes it off. “Nah, he’ll be fine,” and just like that they move on to a new drunken conversational topic, and the next thing Dean knows, it’s morning and he’s trying to peel his eyes open and figure out why there’s a rotting gym sock in his throat.
He groans and rolls over, the events of the night before rushing into his brain. Oh, god. He’s gonna get it.
Sam’s in about the same shape, and it takes them a while to get it together enough to make it to a diner down the street for a greasy hangover cure. They eat slowly in almost complete silence, and when they’re done, Sam stands and yawns.
“Uh, I’m gonna head to the library,” he says. “So you can, you know, face the music.”
Dean smiles faintly. “Wish me luck.” He watches Sam make his way down the street outside the diner window and pulls his phone out of his pocket. He sends a quick text - sober now, want to come over? - and walks back to the motel to wait.
Ten minutes later, Castiel appears. He slouches, hands in his pockets. “Did you have a good time with Sam?” he asks.
“Yeah, it was fun - wait, aren’t you mad?” Dean’s confused. Castiel doesn’t look mad, and it’s not something he usually hides.
“Why would I be mad?” Castiel moves closer and pulls Dean down onto the bed with him, leaning them against each other, and puts his arm around Dean. Normally this would be a bit too close to non-naked cuddling for Dean’s comfort, but he’s too flummoxed to notice.
“Uh, because I got drunk and told Sam your angel stories and made fun of them?”
“Oh,” Cas says. “No, I’m not mad. You didn’t mean it maliciously.”
Dean splutters a bit. “But - I - you should totally be mad at me,” he protests.
“It’s not your fault heaven seems comical,” Castiel says matter-of-factly. “If you could see it as I do, you’d realize that. You can’t perceive all the nuances, that’s all.”
Okay, Dean’s pretty sure that counts as an insult, but right now he doesn’t really care. Castiel slides his arm lower around Dean’s waist and turns in to face him.
“Besides,” he says softly. “The board meetings are nothing but wing-measuring contests. Why do you think I tell you those stories? I enjoy telling my brothers what you have to say about their idiocy.”
“You use my comebacks?” Dean asks incredulously.
“You use my stories,” Castiel replies. “I should make you save the best ones,” he continues. “That way I can tell them to Sam and Bobby myself.”
Dean’s still stuck on the angels getting an earful of Dean Winchester thing. “Am I famous in heaven?” he asks teasingly.
Cas grins slyly. “I think you could say you are infamous in heaven. The specter I invoke to strike panic into the hearts of angels.”
“Dude, I’m totally the bad boy on a motorcycle you use to make your parents nervous.” Dean’s going to enjoy telling Sam about this, but when he does, he leaves out the part where Cas makes a bad pun about bad boys which leads to nakedness.
Some things are private.
3. Don’t forget about your other relationships
It takes approximately two days for Dean to catch on. Sam’s always been kind of whiny, though, and it might’ve taken longer if Castiel hadn’t declared a heaven-wide holiday (under duress, but trying to teach angels about free will led to such things) that apparently lasted for two whole earth weeks and required his presence for the entire time since ‘my absence could result in chaos, Dean’ and ‘I suspect Liraphael may use the commotion to try and break Michael and Lucifer out of hell,’ which, what did he expect, making himself indispensable like that? Not that Dean was bitter.
Anyway, Sam’s been moping extra hard and when Dean finally figures it out, Sam’s on his way to an Olympic gold medal in annoying little brother behavior. After having to go out and get his own dinner for the second day in a row because Sam ‘forgot’ and not being able to take a shower because Sam’s used all the hot water, Dean realizes it’s not just sharing a room for the first time in a while that has Sam acting up and decides it’s time to fix whatever’s wrong. He doesn’t dwell on the fact that he’s the one initiating a serious conversation - stability changes a guy, okay?
Sam’s sighing loudly every so often and messing around on his laptop over on his bed, and Dean refrains from making a thirteen-year-old girl joke, but only just.
“Hey Sammy,” he starts, throwing a lumpy motel pillow across the room at his brother’s head. It lands softly, but Sam still jumps.
“Jesus, Dean!” he yells. “What do you want?”
“Just to spend some time with my only brother. What’s on your enormous mind?”
Sam sighs again. “Nothing.”
“C’mon, tell me. Is it a girl? Did you meet a girl and have no idea how to ask her out?”
Sam frowns and looks scarily close to pouting. “No. Shut up.”
“Man, I’m asking about your feelings, here,” Dean says. “Might want to take advantage of this one time offer.”
“I guess I’m just surprised you can shut up about Castiel long enough to realize I’m even alive,” Sam spits out finally.
Okay, that definitely is not what Dean expected to hear. It kind of cracks him up, though he can see that Sam is serious. “Are you jealous? Of Cas? Really?”
Sam turns blotchy-red and looks two seconds away from stuffing his face in his pillow, a look Dean knows well, though he hasn’t seen it in about fifteen years.
“No,” Sam says. “Not really, I’m just tired and I guess - I guess I just never thought you’d be settled down before me. I’m used to being better at relationships than you, and now I can’t even manage to ask a girl out on a date. And dude, you do talk about him pretty much all the time.” He runs his hand through his messy hair and looks up at Dean with a half-assed smile.
Dean isn’t remotely qualified to counsel anyone about relationships, and being better at them than Sam, currently, isn’t saying all that much. On the other hand, he’s been an expert at handling a moping Sam all his life. He stands and claps his hands together.
“Okay, c’mon, let’s go.” Dean prods Sam’s waist with his foot, pushing him up and off the bed.
“Go where?” Sam whines. “I’m not up for a big night on the town.”
“We’re gonna do your favorite things,” Dean replies. “First we’ll get a wimpy little after-dinner snack at some diva cafe, then we’ll get drunk at a wine bar and I’ll let you lecture me about my bad habits until you pass out, it’ll be great.”
Sam looks intrigued and distrustful. “The cafe with the cheesecake?”
“The one with the cheesecake, now get off your ass.”
***
Two hours later, Dean’s plan is a success and he wishes he had cut Sam off after two bottles.
“Do you know how loud you are?” Sam’s a happy drunk tonight, sweeping his arms to encompass the whole room as he tells everyone about Dean’s sex life. “I had to get another room last week because I could hear the headboard thumping from two floors away, Dean. Two floors!”
Dean is tipsy enough to not blush, but it’s a near thing. “Will you shut up about my love life?” he hisses.
“Awww,” Sam practically yells. “My big brother finally fell in love! I’m just - I’m just really happy for you, even if I never want to hear you say Castiel’s name like that again.”
See, this is why Dean doesn’t let Sam drag him into wine bars. But at least Sam’s not sad anymore, and Dean considers the whole ordeal worth it when Sam’s reaction to Castiel’s return is to clap him on the back with a huge paw and say “welcome to the family.”
Well, he also says “guess it’s time for me to switch motels, you two have a fun night,” as he winks at Cas, but Dean’s letting that go for now.
4. Don’t panic. No, seriously, don’t panic.
It’s three days later when Dean suddenly has his long-awaited gay relationship freakout. It’s not a gay freakout, really, because he’s long since accepted that he’s not all the way straight. After spending forty years in hell and then living through an apocalypse, he can put things into perspective. In the big picture, liking the feel of stubble and the fact that Cas can hold him down with one hand isn’t anything to be worried about, and if he’s being exceptionally honest, he’ll acknowledge that even before hell, he’d thought about it.
So maybe it’s more of a relationship freakout, period.
Castiel had spent the night, and when Dean woke up in a familiar warm sprawl all over Cas’s chest and thought I want to wake up like this every day for the rest of my life, he’d barely finished thinking it before panic set in and he practically ran to the shower. He’d washed and gotten dressed before Castiel could even think about joining him, and when Dean made up a particularly transparent excuse about shopping for supplies and didn’t Cas need to get back to heaven already, Cas had just blanked his face of any expression and disappeared.
The next night Cas comes back as usual and shows no sign that he knows Dean’s acting strangely. Dean’s flipping frantically through a skinmag at the exact moment Cas shows up in an attempt to convince himself that he misses boobs, and Castiel doesn’t even mention it, just says hello and drags Dean out to dinner in a bar, despite Dean’s best efforts at derailing the whole visit into a sex marathon.
At the bar, once their food and beers have been ordered, Dean commandeers a pool table and eyes up a couple of blondes who quickly ask if they can play.
Castiel watches as Dean gathers a crowd, men and women looking on as he shoots pool and flirts with anyone who looks at him more than once. He knows he’s doing it, knows the train wreck he’s asking for, but he can’t stop. Even when his burger arrives, he doesn’t go back to the booth where Cas is waiting silently, just balances the plate on the corner of the pool table and takes occasional bites. The first blonde gives him a look eventually, then turns to the corner where Cas sits.
“You gonna get in trouble for playing with us?” she asks Dean.
He gives her a slow smile. “Nah, he likes to watch,” he says. He feels like it’s not him talking, like he’s seeing things from a distance, unable to stop himself.
“Doesn’t look like it,” she replies, gesturing behind Dean, who only has a second to turn before he feels Castiel’s hands on his shoulders.
“Excuse us,” Cas tells the woman, not unkindly. He pushes Dean along in front of him and Dean can feel his glare burning a hole in the back of his head as Dean grabs his beer from a table on the way.
“Of course,” Castiel exclaims once he’s shoved Dean back into their booth, less upset than Dean thought he’d looked earlier. “I thought you might be trying to make me angry for some reason, but you’re just having your commitment crisis. I should have noticed sooner.”
“What?” Dean sputters gracelessly, beer spraying all over the table in an epic spit-take.
Cas shakes his head fondly. “Your crisis, the stage of our relationship where you desperately try to convince yourself that you are still attracted to random women and that you don’t want to be stuck with one partner for the foreseeable future, in order to cover your feelings of inadequacy and your fear that you’ll screw everything up and bring nothing but pain to those who love you.”
That’s - that’s scarily accurate, Dean is horrified to admit. “Who - I mean - what - how do you know all that?”
Cas frowns. “Sam was very clear about the symptoms. I’m sure that’s what you’re experiencing.” Cas looks deep in thought for a moment, then fixes his deadly serious stare on Dean, who reacts predictably by feeling equal parts nervous and turned on. He stays still as Cas reaches out to touch his forehead and then he’s sitting on the motel bed as Cas kneels in front of him.
Cas keeps his gaze firmly on Dean for a long, long moment, before breaking it to shake his head and sigh, sounding heavily put upon.
“I know it’s not entirely your fault,” Cas growls, and Dean shivers. “But you are the most emotionally wrecked human being I have ever seen, including the young girl with the absentee postal worker father at the brothel you took me to, and she didn’t even have a brother who loved her.”
Cas pulls Dean’s face toward his own. “I am going to tell you this once, and I expect you to listen. I chose you, Dean. I will not change my mind, and I know my choice is the right one.”
Dean’s trying hard to keep his eyes open, focusing on Castiel’s throat, the sliver of skin visible behind his loose collar, but all he wants to do is close them and lean in to kiss Castiel senseless. Cas can see his intention and keeps him at an arms-length, gripping his shoulders.
“Do you understand?” It’s an order, not a question.
Dean nods, then gasps, “yes, Cas, c’mon,” reaching for Cas’s waist and surging up into the kiss as Cas pushes him back on the bed and covers him with his body.
He spends the rest of the night trying to show Cas how much he means it, how well he understands.
***
A few days later, after Cas manages to spill the whole embarrassing ordeal in the bar to Sam, the teasing starts. Sam and Dean are lounging in Bobby’s living room watching tv and snacking on chips and beer while Bobby cleans his guns in the dining room. Cas is away on angel business.
“Couldn’t you have had your crisis a little earlier?” Sam asks during a commercial.
Dean isn’t suspicious at first, which just goes to show how relaxed he is now that everything’s back to normal. “It wasn’t a crisis, Sammy, it was character-building.”
“I almost won the pool!” Sam says. “Two weeks sooner and I could’ve finally gotten a new laptop without feeling guilty.”
Dean turns his head sharply. “Pool?” he asks, practically growling.
Bobby hears and yells from the dining room. “I nailed it! Seven months in, on the dot!”
That is absolutely it. “Sam,” Dean starts calmly. “Did you have a bet with Bobby about the timing of my not-actually-a-crisis gay crisis?” By the end of the sentence his voice has gotten fairly shrill, and much, much louder.
Sam barely registers the words over his own laughter. He’s shaking on the couch and wheezing for breath, and the sight is enough to deflate Dean’s indignation. Bobby comes in and leans against the wall next to the couch, shaking his head, and that’s when Dean realizes he’s laughing too, leaning against Sam’s shoulder with tears in his eyes.
Sam’s snorting through his nose. “Not actually-a-crisis gay crisis?” he sputters, hands flailing into Dean’s face.
“Yeah, yeah,” Dean replies, getting control over his laughter. “You owe me half of that pot, Bobby.”
“Like hell I do, boy,” Bobby grunts. “Make your own damn bets.”
Sam stops rolling all over the place and nudges Dean with his shoulder. “You’re such a jerk, Dean.”
“Bitch,” Dean replies happily. Yeah, things are back to normal.
5. It’s okay to think about the future
Life runs along smoothly for a while, or as smoothly as it can go when it involves tracking down monsters and evading the IRS. Good hunts are getting a little hard to find, since demonic activity is at a low Dean hasn’t seen in his lifetime before, and sometimes they arrive at the scene of a haunting to find that other hunters have beaten them to the punch.
At first it’s nice to have a break, but Dean gets restless and Sam starts looking up colleges and forgetting to clear his browser history, which is how Dean knows about it. He braces himself for change, like he’s been doing daily since Sam came back, but Sam doesn’t make a move until it's been two years since the apocalypse.
They’re at Bobby’s, Dean helping with car repairs and Sam hanging around the library, taking a break from motels. Castiel comes for dinner most nights, and 1950’s housewife jokes aside, Dean likes the regularity of working on cars all day and then making dinner for his little makeshift family.
One night as Sam is cleaning up and Cas and Dean are lounging at the table, watching him, Sam drops the bomb.
“So, I’m thinking maybe I could go back to school?” he says, trying to be nonchalant but mostly just sounding scared.
“Oh yeah?” Dean replies. “What school? I’m thinking the east coast probably has a place we could agree on, somewhere with a garage I could work at, when I’m not enjoying my life as a kept man.”
Sam turns away from the sink and stares. Castiel’s eyes move from Dean to Sam and back again and Dean thinks he must be enjoying the show.
“You’re not going to try and stop me?” Sam asks. “Keep me in the family business? Refuse to come along, and sever all contact?”
“Well, you may not have noticed, but I’m getting kind of old,” Dean replies, shrugging his shoulders. “Still hot as hell, but kinda old. I could do with a break from getting slammed into walls.” He sneaks a look at Cas and adds, “and I could use a regular bed.”
“I guess this means my prepared lecture about the merits of a college town hunting base is useless,” Sam sighs.
“You didn’t - ” Dean starts, then stops. Who knows? Maybe Sam was that prepared.
“No, of course not,” Sam scoffs, twisting his hands together. “But - you’re really okay with that?”
Dean surreptitiously plays footsie with Cas under the table and smiles. “Yeah, Sam, let’s be real boys for a while.”
***
Later that night, alone in the guestroom with Cas, Dean realizes that this is it, this is the rest of his life, and he’s happy about it. He shifts in the bed and looks at Cas, who’s been watching him doze, the creeper.
“You sure you want to do this?” Dean asks. “Stick around here with the mud monkeys and watch me make an ass of myself, and get crap from all the other angels about slumming it?”
Cas moves a hand lazily up and down Dean’s side, scratching lightly with his nails. “I believe I’ve made my feelings about you perfectly clear. I am where are I want to be. Are you?”
“I am, you know I am, but - what about when I’m old? What happens when I die?” Dean wants to shoot himself in the face once he hears what he’s saying, but it’s out, no helping it now.
“We will handle that when the time comes,” Cas says, and Dean wants to believe him.
“After all,” Cas finishes. “I am kind of a big deal in heaven.”
Dean doesn’t argue anymore.
The end
ETA: short sequel