Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Cas slept in for the first time in years, maybe in his life, on the Saturday after his bar exam. He woke up groggy and grumpy with a face full of over-warm sunlight, groaning and grumbling his way across his rumpled bedding to yank the curtains shut. He was exhausted from the long weeks of studying that were now behind him and a headache from oversleeping kicked in the minute he deigned to move. He seriously contemplated falling face-first back into bed and compounding the problem by sleeping even more.

The smell of coffee from the kitchen and the buzz of an incoming message on his phone combined to just barely convince him otherwise. He sighed down at his phone. Coffee first, he decided, and God or Buddha or whoever bless the inventor of the automated coffee maker in the first place.

He shambled naked out of the bedroom, scratching idly at his chest and wondering if he had a single item of food in his kitchen that wouldn’t require effort. He only bothered with cooking when it was for someone else.

He went for a piss, then grabbed the first of what would be several cups of coffee and a bottle of aspirin, taking both back to the bedroom. It was a very nice bedroom, objectively, if not exactly “him.” His sister Hester, whose career was interior design, had basically just grabbed his credit card and kicked him out of his own apartment for a day when he’d moved into this place. It was bougie, all off-white and burnt umber and black accents, classy and comfortable. Hester was good at what she did, even if it was kind of obvious she didn’t know her own brother particularly well. Par for the course in this family.

He set the coffee and aspirin down next to the ever-present supply of weed on one of the stupid floating shelves that Hester had installed, so he could put on some underwear and a t-shirt and not fully scandalize the whole neighborhood when he opened the curtains back up. Then he picked up his phone and snapped a picture of his gathered supplies and sent it to Meg with the caption breakfast of champions.

Seems about right, she replied. She was clearly still typing, so Cas brought it all over to the open window to sit on the sill with his head and shoulders leaning out into the light. He lit up a blunt while he waited for her and washed down a couple of aspirin with a too-hot first swallow of coffee. Cas was not one to let the threat of being scalded get between him and caffeine.

His phone buzzed. If you want some actual food, we could go grab brunch. Your treat, obviously, Mr. Bigshot Lawyer Man.

He contemplated it. Brunch with Meg was never just brunch, of course. It would be boozy and bitchy, and then they would go back to her place and laugh their way through sex. He’d spent many enjoyable Saturdays during law school that way, but today he was kind of worn out and wanted to save what energy he did have for his plans for the evening.

Knowing that his lack of immediate reply was already answer enough for Meg, he quickly checked his other messages. There were a few congratulatory things from relatives and friends that he could answer later, but the one from his dad he opened right away.

I don’t care what you do with your weekend, but I expect you in the office at eight o’clock on Monday so bear that in mind.

Cas rolled his eyes and took a long drag. As if he’d ever been late to work a day in his fucking life.

Of course, sir , he replied quickly, wondering who had snitched to Dad about the younger generations’ plans for a night out. Then he went back to the thread with Meg and wrote nah, feel like shit this morning, but maybe next week. He tried not to think about the fact that if they did hook up next weekend, it would probably be for the last time. He didn’t invite her to come along tonight, either, because she got along with the rest of his friends and family about as well as a feral cat at a dog park.

He was so trained to be studying or working at every idle moment that just sitting by his window with his coffee and his blunt felt like playing hooky. And he intended to indulge in every illicit moment of his last weekend of freedom, so he went and grabbed a second coffee and came right back to the window to get a proper weekend high. It required a certain callous disregard for the full might of the California sun in August, and he was already sporting the beginnings of a sunburn across his nose when he finally got bored enough to look for something else to do.

He spent the day feeling lazy and indulgent. He went down to the gym in his building for a while, but he skipped cardio. He ordered delivery from Chateau Lemongrass. He looked through his closet to get an outfit together for the night, as well as making sure the nice suits (courtesy of his aunt and uncle as a graduation gift) didn’t warrant a dry cleaner’s visit before Monday. He watched whatever stupid show Amazon recommended to him for some background noise. He kept a maintenance high the whole time because being alone with his thoughts when he didn’t have any people or assignments to distract him was turning out to be fucking intolerable.

Gabe and Balthazar descended upon him at eight-thirty. He was in the shower and unaware they somehow had a key to his place, and was not even remotely expecting them to be sitting on his bed arguing about whether Balthazar should swipe left or right when Cas walked in bare-assed with his hair still dripping water. He could be forgiven for shouting in surprise and throwing an ashtray at them.

“Jesus, put that thing away!” Balthazar yelped, falling back dramatically with a hand over his eyes while Gabe made exaggerated retching noises.

“You wanna sneak into my house then you don’t get to complain about what you see!” Cas shouted as he grabbed the first pair of underwear his hand touched and retreated to his tiny hallway to put them on. “Fuck you guys!”

“Be nice to us, Cassie, we’re family.”

“I’ll be nice when you give me my key back,” he said, stepping back into the room and going for the pants he laid out on his bed before the shower.

“Never,” Gabe said, snatching the pants away from him. “Someone has to be able to perform a wellness check next time we don’t hear from you for two weeks.”

“I was studying, not that you would know what that means. Will you fucking give me those? What are you even doing here? I thought we were meeting at Purgatory.”

“We’re rescuing you from showing up in jeans and only being able to get the attention of tasteless bitches,” Balthazar said. “Gender-neutral term, obviously.”

Cas rolled his eyes, and Gabe cackled.

“Someday you’re going to roll your eyes hard enough that they get stuck in the back of your head.”

“You. Are wearing jeans,” Cas said through gritted teeth.

“Yeah, because these ones make my ass look amazing?” Gabe shot back. “Bowser brought a bunch of different shirts, I’m stealing one to change into.”

“I could swear that we all became able to pronounce my name at around age seven,” Balthazar sighed, but that was a battle lost long ago and he knew it.

Cas noticed the nice little weekend travel bag sitting at the foot of his bed now. He stopped and held up a finger and walked out of the room. He heard them futzing around trying to connect to the Bluetooth speaker on his nightstand, while he was fetching a bottle of Grey Goose from his freezer and his cigarettes from where he’d tossed them on the kitchen counter the previous night. He re-entered the room while swigging directly from the bottle, still holding his finger up as some shitty pop song started playing from Gabe’s phone. His cousins miraculously obeyed, shoving at each other but not speaking as he handed the bottle over, then stalked to the window. Once he’d lit up and taken a drag, he finally lowered his hand.

“There. Now I can deal with your shit. Show me what I’m wearing.”

Balthazar already had the bag open and was holding up a shirt in each fist. “Purple or black?”

“Not purple,” Cas tried to say, but Balthazar cut him off.

“Ah-ah! Not you. I’m asking Gabe.”

Gabe was suspiciously not chugging vodka, just holding the bottle.

“You’re not drinking?”

“I’m playing DD tonight,” Gabe shrugged.

“Why?" Cas asked. "We can just get an Uber.”

Gabe smiled his most courtroom-shark smile. “Kali said if I come home drunk or smelling of another woman’s perfume she’s going to divorce me, and your dad says the family reputation can’t afford another divorce this year and he’ll have me shipped off to one of those European spa things that are secretly rehab if I don’t sort it out.”

“The European spa things aren’t that bad,” Balthazar said.

“You also said that about boarding school and look what that did to you,” Cas said skeptically. “Gabe, you could consider not cheating on Kali every time you get drunk, and then maybe she wouldn’t immediately associate the drinking with the cheating.”

“Oh my god, we’re not talking about this,” Gabe said, jumping up and stealing a cigarette from Cas’s pack. Cas shoved him over to the window to prevent him from lighting up right in the middle of the room. “Anyway, back to the matter at hand: did you bring that see-through shirt, Bowser?”

“No,” Cas answered before Balthazar could.

Both of them were grinning at him. He took another long pull each from the bottle and the cigarette.

“Fuck you both.”

Anna and Ruby were officially drunk and/or high enough to start making out just to tantalize other people, and Cas didn’t necessarily need to watch his cousin macking on his most competitive law school frenemy, so he decided it was time for his next drink.

He’d been striking out on the dance floor anyway, courtesy of Hannah. There had been a lovely woman in a blue dress named Daphne that he’d hit it off with, but Hannah kept trying to insert herself because she had never once been able to grasp in all their years at school together that Castiel was not into her, so Daphne had drifted away, and last he’d seen her she was dancing with Uriel, who was his second most competitive frenemy. Cas had danced with Raphael for a couple of minutes just to scrape Hannah off, which had thankfully worked. He and Raph loathed each other, of course, but Raph was hot so it wasn’t all bad.

He wove through the packed crowd to the bar, plucking Bowser’s stupid sheer shirt away from his chest. He was feeling grudgingly grateful for it since it was keeping him from having a heat stroke in the crowded bar. He was less grateful about the body glitter and makeup that Hannah and Ruby had forced on him in the girls’ bathroom. The other women who filtered in and out didn’t even complain about a man’s presence, instead cat-calling Castiel and suggesting eyeshadow colors.

But what did it really matter? He was here to drink the alcohol that his friends and family bought him and accept all the pats on the back about finishing the bar exam, and hopefully find someone hot to go home with. One last hurrah before his dad and the title of Junior Partner at Milton, Shurley, and Adler officially took over his life. He fully expected his dad to start hinting that he should be dating Anael Adler before the month was out and no doubt the entire extended bunch would be looking for an engagement ring by Christmas. Weirdly enough, for all his controlling bullshit, his father wasn’t homophobic and probably would accept Raph as an option. So it was too bad about the loathing.

Just for a change of pace and to avoid getting too drunk too fast, he ordered a beer. Someone bumped into his back while he was waiting, and they were already apologizing when he turned to look at them.

“Sorry, man, it’s just crowded—oh, wow. Hi, there,” the guy grinned. Cas’s physical response was embarrassingly immediate, but in his defense the guy was incredibly hot and smiling at him with pretty obvious flirtation.

“No need to apologize,” Cas said quickly, raising a hand to flag the bartender down again. “What are you drinking?”

“Oh, you’re real sure of yourself, aren’t you?” the guy said, but his stance was loose and relaxed, and his smile was self-assured, so Cas took it as a statement that the guy liked it.

“Should I not be?” Cas asked, shuffling a little closer even though they were barely a foot apart in the first place.

The guy was dressed in a simple outfit, black pants and a white t-shirt that glowed faintly purple in all the flashing lights. He had a few bracelets on his wrists and rings on his fingers. His eye color was hard to tell, but Cas’s eyes were caught on the dusting of freckles across flawless cheekbones and the fullness of his lips, which parted as Cas moved in closer. The tip of the guy’s tongue crept out to lick at his lower lip.

“I just got here, maybe I want to shop around a little,” the guy chuckled. “Or hang with my friends,” he said, jerking his head toward a trio of women who were elbowing each other and giggling.

“I wouldn’t dream of stopping you,” Cas said. “But let me buy you a drink anyway.”

The guy’s smile remained easy, open, so Cas figured he wasn’t pushing too hard. “Yeah, why not?” he said. “What’s your name?”

“Cas. You?”

The guy’s eyes went wide and interested, his face shining eager in the strobing lights. “Tell me that’s not short for Cassady.”

“No, it’s short for Castiel. Why?”

“Whew, close call. My name’s Dean. I’m named after the character in the Kerouac novel, who’s based on a guy named Cassady. Would have just been funny, is all. Would have had me believing in fate or something. You said Castiel?”

Cas had no idea what the hell the guy was talking about, but at least he’d got his name. “Yeah, but everyone calls me Cas.”

“I like it. Castiel,” Dean said, pronouncing each syllable thoroughly and lingering over them like he was savoring them. “It’s exotic.”

Cas couldn’t help the genuine smile that pulled out of him. “If you say so.”

“More exciting than Dean, anyway,” he laughed, putting a familiar hand on Cas’s shoulder. “Nice to meet you.”

Cas’s beer landed in front of him, and he pushed it toward Dean. “Here… unless you want something more exotic?”

Dean laughed again, grabbing the beer and taking a long drink. Cas tracked the way his lips wrapped around the neck of the bottle and the ripple of his throat as he swallowed. He lowered the bottle and his smile dropped into something a little softer, a little more personal.

“Hell, who am I kidding, you’re definitely the hottest guy here and I like talking to you,” Dean said. “Let’s get a couple of shots and hit the dance floor, huh?”

“That sounds great,” Cas said.

They made small talk while they waited for the bartender’s attention to finally swing their way. Dean was here to celebrate, too. He was an aspiring actor who’d come to Hollywood from Kansas, which was so typical as to be nearly painful, and a movie he’d been in had just been released. The girls he’d come with all worked on the movie set; a camera operator, an effects artist, and a set designer. You couldn’t spit in this town without hitting someone who worked in the movie business, so Cas was used to it. Dean seemed shocked to find out that Cas was a lawyer rather than an actor or model himself.

“You obviously know you’re hot,” Dean argued as six shot glasses of tequila finally appeared. “You could totally make it in Hollywood.”

Cas just shrugged. “It’s the family business.” He pointed out his cousins and friends. “About ninety percent of us wind up as lawyers or judges or police. Bowser’s a music producer and my sister is a designer and everybody thinks they’re weird. Anyway, who cares about all that crap? I’m here to drink and dance.”

Dean grabbed a glass. “Hell yeah. Cheers.”

They clinked their glasses, shot their tequila, bit into their lime wedges and laughed at each other’s squinted expressions. They quickly finished off the rest of their shots and made their way over to dance, with Dean keeping a hand on Cas’s shoulder to avoid getting separated, and shooting an exaggerated wink back at his friends.

Cas’s own party were all giving him thumbs up and exaggeratedly-mouthed “nice ” statements of approval as they saw him come back. He ignored them all, because the only thing he cared about was getting his hands on Dean’s gyrating hips as soon as possible. Dean clearly didn’t mind, as his hands were already stroking at Cas’s chest and into his sweat-dampened hair.

The dancing got dirty, fast. Cas had meant to take a drinking break and instead he’d shot tequila like an undergrad, which meant he was well and truly soused. Dean’s ass ground against Cas’s pelvis and thighs, and Cas fisted a hand in Dean’s hair and sucked a kiss into the back of his neck. Cas kept thinking any minute now he was going to yank Dean toward the bathrooms but every time, the song would change and Dean’s eyes would light up and he’d say something like “I love this song!” or “oh my god, now that’s a beat I can shake my ass to!” and so they kept dancing. Daphne in the blue dress came back and sandwiched herself between them, but Dean didn’t seem to mind, so Cas didn’t either. They both paid her some attention and they were all having fun, until she got lured off by Dean’s trio of girlfriends.

Dean was the one who dragged him off the dance floor, in the end.

Finally they played a song that Dean didn’t care about, or maybe he’d just had enough of foreplay, because he sent both of them crashing into a bathroom stall and kicked it shut with his hands already halfway down Cas’s pants. In the new lighting situation, Cas finally got to see that Dean’s eyes were a brilliant shade of green. Cas focused on getting his hands under Dean’s t-shirt, feeling up his Hollywood-perfect body, while Dean was focused on getting their pants and Cas’s shirt buttons open. Cas attacked Dean’s neck with his mouth and made Dean moan, grabbed a solid handful of Dean’s pert ass that made Cas moan with satisfaction right back. Dean finally freed both their erections. Cas immediately pressed in close, trapping both of their cocks between two flat, toned stomachs. Dean shuddered happily and bit at his ear and pawed at his bare chest.

They both pulled back enough to get hands around each other. Cas thumbed the head of Dean’s cock and gathered a bit of precome to smooth over his hot, sensitive skin.

“Fuck, yes,” Dean said. His own hand stuttered on Cas’s erection without accomplishing much. “Yeah, Castiel, please.” He said Cas’s full name so reverently, and it was going straight to his dick, which he’d thought was about as hard as it could get, but apparently not because it plumped up just a little more in response to Dean’s hoarse whispers. “Oh my god, oh my god,” Dean whimpered. “I want that in my mouth. Please tell me I can suck you off.”

Cas nibbled along Dean’s jaw and worked his dick with firm, even strokes, going back frequently to catch the dribble from the tip and smear it with his palm. “Whatever you want, I’ll let you do whatever you want, but come for me first.”

“I can wait,” Dean panted, his head thrown back against the wall of the stall and his eyes glazed over with pleasure. “I wanna get you in my mouth. Come on.”

“I want to see you,” Cas insisted, reaching his other hand into Dean’s shirt to tweak a nipple and feeling pleasantly rewarded by the way his breath caught and stopped for a moment. “You first.”

“That gets you hot, the other guy coming first?”

“Yes,” Cas said simply, focusing most of his energy on working Dean over. “Or girl.”

“Oh god, yeah,” Dean said, hands clawing into Cas’s hips. “I always gotta eat a girl out before I do anything else with her. Nothing hotter than a woman having an orgasm.”

“Nothing?” Cas said, pinching at his nipple again.

Dean smirked, even as he was steadily reaching his peak. “Change my mind.”

Cas moved his hand down to cup Dean’s balls and roll them in his hand. “Working on it.”

Dean didn’t last long, coming with his face pressed against Cas’s shoulder to muffle his groan. Cas held him up like that for a minute, feeling Dean’s panting slow even as he dazedly mouthed along Cas’s neck. Cas grabbed some toilet paper and cleaned the come off their bellies, grateful it hadn’t gotten on their clothes.

Then Dean slithered down to his knees, pushing Cas’s hips against the partition wall.

“My turn,” he murmured, pulling a condom out of his pocket. He maintained eye contact with Cas the entire time he was fitting the condom over him, and Cas was breathless from the combination of dark, hungry eyes and sure hands on his dick. Once he was wrapped, Dean slowly and carefully worked his way down Cas’s length as far as he could go before he ran out of mouth. He wrapped his hand around the base, humming happily, and got to work. Cas watched Dean’s cheeks hollow and felt the tip of Dean’s tongue sliding against the underside of him, and Cas breathed in quick, shallow gasps, letting his hands rest on Dean’s shoulders.

Dean’s eyes were closed and he looked blissed out. Cas’s body glitter was all over Dean’s face and neck and hands, and he was definitely smearing it on Cas’s cock. It would probably be funny if there was a single active brain cell in Cas’s head, but he was busy getting one of the best blowjobs of his life. Sweat dripped from his hairline and trickled down his neck and bared chest, but he barely noticed because his entire sense of self was centered on Dean’s mouth. He lifted an unsteady hand to play with Dean’s hair and Dean somehow looked even more blissful, groaning and sending vibrations along Cas’s shaft that made Cas shiver.

Cas didn’t last long, either. Dean wore a very self-satisfied smile as he slipped his mouth off and stood up to help Cas remove his condom and clean off.

They stayed for a minute to exchange lazy kisses while straightening up each other’s clothes and smoothing out their hair a little. Dean teased Cas for the stripe of sunburn on his nose that he was finally noticing, told him it was adorable, which was certainly not a word Cas had ever heard applied to himself before. Dean was smiling nonstop and Cas was pretty satisfied with where his night had ended up.

“Hmm, still think women might be hotter,” Dean said. “Maybe we have to do that again sometime, just to test the theory out a little more.”

The crazy part was that Cas genuinely wanted to say yes. But the hesitation was there, and Dean was observant enough to pick it up.

“Yeah, you know what? I’m going with, this has been magical and awesome and let’s leave it at that. You were amazing, Castiel.”

“So are you,” Cas replied, letting his hand linger on Dean’s cheek and stroking a thumb against his lips. “I don’t want you to think my hesitation is to do with you.”

“Pffftt, of course not,” Dean said jovially. “I’m hot shit. See you around, tiger.” He swaggered out of the stall without a care in the world and winked at the first guy who glared in his direction. He washed his hands and exited.

Cas locked the door and stayed in the stall for another couple of minutes, staring at nothing, hands loose at his sides. He breathed through the unexpected twist of disappointment in his guts.

Dean was beautiful, and funny, and confident, and interesting, and Cas liked him. Kind of wished he could see him again. He even thought he might have liked to take him on a proper date, the kind that involved dinner or a museum or something, before inviting him home for a whole night of fucking and maybe even making him breakfast in the morning.

But that part of his life was coming to an end, and he’d gone out clubbing tonight with a fixed idea in his mind that this was the last time he’d do this. Come Monday, his career properly started and so did the search for some respectable partner with whom to share exactly two children. And that was what Cas wanted. He liked studying law and he was looking forward to being a lawyer. He’d worked his ass off because he liked being the good kid in the family. He liked being someone people could count on, someone to be proud of. He liked it when Gabe or Anna or Bowser did something stupid and his dad looked at him like he was glad Cas was his son.

So a minute later, when he had his head screwed back on, he took a leak and washed his hands and went back out to find his friends and have one more dance and one more drink with them. He didn’t look for Dean in the crowd.

Their leaving was the usual jumble of shouting and laughing and arguing about who was going where. Balthazar and Hannah were walking with Anna back to her place and maybe sleeping there, since her boyfriend was out of town and couldn’t protest about the inconvenience; Raph and Uriel were going to go find a pizza with Daphne, who had attached to the two of them but still did not seem certain which of them she would follow home afterward; Ruby was hitching a ride with Gabe back to Cas’s place to sleep on Cas’s sofa because she was too drunk to schlep all the way to her place; and Gabe would go to his own home because if he didn’t, Kali would either file for divorce or possibly just stab him to death with a kitchen knife.

Ruby called shotgun and Cas didn’t care, climbing into the mess of empty fast-food bags and candy bar wrappers in Gabe’s backseat. He was starting to sober up, which left him feeling tired, but he’d have to keep it together a while longer. He wanted a tall glass of water and a cigarette before he went to sleep. He’d have to get Ruby a blanket for the couch and a towel for the shower and a t-shirt to sleep in, too. She was almost certainly going to smoke all his weed and not even say thank you about the hospitality.

He rested his head against the glass of the window. In his reflection, he saw that the makeup on his face had smeared, making it look like he had a black eye. He stared at himself until Gabe caught his attention with a couple of sudden, jerking braking maneuvers while trying to back out of the space. Cas couldn’t tell what was going on, but Gabe was the sober driver so it was his responsibility to worry about it. Cas dismissed Gabe’s driving and his own reflection in favor of daydreaming about Dean’s lips.

They cruised along for a couple of minutes, but the second time Gabe drifted over the lane line and jerked the wheel to correct it, Cas broke himself free of his reminiscing and glared at him.

“What the fuck, Gabe?”

“It’s fiiiine,” Gabe sang, and Ruby giggled.

“Yeah, Cas, don’t be such a wet blanket,” she slurred. “Even though you can’t help it. Pathological for you.”

“Gabe!” Cas snapped, his heart picking up speed. “Are you fucking drunk?”

“No,” Gabe said with a smug smirk. “I barely drank at all. I know when to stop.”

“Are you serious? Pull over.”

“We’re like three blocks from your place, Cassie, it’s all good,” Gabe said.

“Pull the fuck over right now, Gabriel!”

“Oooo, you got full-named,” Ruby giggled. “Think he’s serious, Gabe.”

“He can shove serious up his ass along with the dick of that gorgeous guy he hooked up with,” Gabe laughed, looking over his shoulder at them and smirking and paying absolutely zero attention to the light turning red up ahead.

“Gabe!” Cas shouted. “Stop!”

Gabe seemed to take that as another plea to pull over, and pressed the gas pedal even harder in response, while Ruby howled like a wolf out of her open window.

According to later evidence in court, Gabe was going twenty miles per hour over the speed limit at the time he entered the intersection and t-boned the beautiful black 1967 Chevy Impala that was being driven by Charlotte Bradbury, en route to drop off Donna Hanscum and Jody Mills at their shared apartment before continuing on with Dean Winchester in the front passenger seat to their own shared apartment. It was Dean’s vehicle, but Charlie had chosen not to drink that evening and decided to drive them all home. She’d been driving in a safe and careful manner. Gabe sent both cars careening across the thankfully otherwise-empty intersection and onto the shoulder of the road.

Cas didn’t know what had happened, for those first few seconds.

The squeal of the tires, the crunch of metal and glass, the feeling that they’d left their stomachs a few yards behind them—it was confusing, sudden, and for a moment, all Cas knew was that he was shaky and nauseated. He’d been flung forward, caught by the seatbelt, and flung back to crack his head against the window. Then he heard screaming, and he blinked, and saw Gabe crumpled into the embrace of his deflating airbag, Ruby bleeding from the head as she fought with her own airbag, and just barely visible past all that was the crumpled side of a second car. But Cas was fine, he thought giddily. Somehow, he was fine.

“Ruby!” he shouted, unbuckling himself and stumbling out of his door to come forward to her open window. “Fuck, Ruby, are you okay?”

“I hit my head,” she moaned, pressing a hand to the gash on her forehead. That she was talking and alert was something, at least.

“Gabe?”

“M’okay,” Gabe muttered, bracing on the tangle of fabric covering the steering wheel and lifting himself to sit upright. “Don’t feel hurt. Think I’m good.”

First things first: Cas called 9-1-1. He hung up as soon as he’d given bare details about the number of cars and their location, because people were hurt and there was every possibility some of them couldn’t wait for an ambulance.

Cas quickly made Ruby follow his finger with her eyes, determined she had a mild but not serious concussion, and told her to keep pressure on her injury. Then he stumbled over to the other car. The front of Gabe’s car had left a deep crumpled-in dent in the front passenger side door and there was no room to approach it, so he went around to the driver’s side, and felt the first swoop of real, true horror when he vaguely recognized the redheaded woman in the driver’s seat. She was leaning away from her window toward her passenger, hands hovering uselessly over him.

“Dean?” she sobbed out. “Oh my god, Dean?”

Cas couldn’t believe it, didn’t want to believe it, but he peered through her window and saw the man he’d just had sex with in a club bathroom slumped and unconscious, held upright only by his seatbelt. Blood trickled sluggishly from where a huge piece of glass was embedded in his face. Cas turned and vomited into the grass.

He could hear another 9-1-1 call in progress in the backseat, one of the other two friends shakily babbling into her cellphone. The woman on the passenger side looked like she was in pain, but Cas didn’t see any visible injuries. Cas took a few deep breaths, and got as much of his composure as he possibly could.

He knocked gently on the driver’s door to get the woman’s attention. “Hey. Are you all right?”

“My friend, oh my god, he’s—” she gasped, barely even looking at Cas.

“Yeah, I see that. I’d like to have a look at him, but first I want to make sure you aren’t injured.”

“I don’t think I am,” she said, turning a pale face toward him, but then she winced and put a hand to her neck. “My neck hurts.”

“You probably have whiplash. Fingers and toes all working?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, that’s great news. Can you get out and let me sit there?”

“Are you a doctor?”

“No, but I trained as an EMT for a few months.” He opened the door, and held out his hand to help her out of the car, figuring an assertive approach was best. It seemed to do the trick. She turned slowly, carefully, wincing the whole time, to put her feet on the ground and put her hands in his. He lifted her to her feet and passed her into the waiting arms of her other friend.

“Wait, aren’t you…?” asked the blond woman who took the red-headed woman into her embrace. The dark-haired woman was slowly sliding out on the same side, clutching her shoulder and gasping.

“Ma’am, do you need immediate attention?” Cas asked her.

“No,” she replied, hard-faced. “No, Dean needs help first.”

“Please say something if any of you start feeling dizzy or numb or have trouble speaking,” Cas said firmly, and climbed into the vacated seat. He saw immediately that it was pretty bad. Dean’s right leg was crushed in between the crumpled-in door and the dashboard, and his breathing was poor, which wasn’t good. Cas inspected the glass in his face and determined that it hadn’t damaged his actual eye, which was better news.

He put a hand to the uninjured side of Dean’s face, felt sick to his stomach again when he saw a smear of glitter there.

“Dean?” he whispered.

Dean grunted, and turned his face into Cas’s hand as if seeking him.

“Wake up, Dean,” Cas urged, tapping a finger against his cheek.

His eyes fluttered open.

“Castiel,” he said with a faint smile. Then his face turned alarmed and he sucked a wheezing, terrible breath. His eyes flickered all over, going wider and panicky. “What—?” he coughed. “I can’t—breathe.”

“It’s okay,” Cas said immediately, grabbing both his hands and squeezing them. “Look at me. You’re okay. Stay calm. We’re going to breathe together.” He sucked in an obvious breath, held it, let it out. “Like this, okay?”

Dean shivered in his grasp. “I’m—hurt—bad—”

“Yes you are,” Cas said, holding his eyes and feeling absurdly grateful that he didn’t seem to have a severe head injury as well. “But there are paramedics on the way. And you’re going to be fine. I’m right here with you. All you need to do until they get here is breathe.”

“My leg—” Hot tears were sliding down Dean’s face, mixing with the blood trailing from the glass that only just hadn’t taken out his eye, and his hands started to squeeze Cas’s so hard that it hurt.

“Nothing we can do about that right now. I know it probably hurts, that your chest and face hurt, too, but you’re going to make it. Just breathe with me.”

Dean nodded, shaky, and started breathing with him. It was sharp, shallow, pained. His eyes kept drifting to his leg, and Cas kept using their joined hands to direct Dean by the chin back to look at Cas instead. Once he’d got Dean breathing in a decent rhythm, he turned and asked if any of the girls had blankets or jackets or anything. They dug a pair of denim jackets out of the backseat and Cas folded one to press firmly over the blood soaking into Dean’s pant leg. He had to practically sit in his lap to do it. He used the other jacket to drape over Dean’s lap, hiding the sight of his leg from him, and helping him keep warm. Dean cried the whole time, breathing through pursed lips that had a faint tinge of blood at the corner.

Cas stayed with him until the paramedics arrived, and before they were separated, he ducked his head to drop a furtive kiss to Dean’s knuckles.

“You did so well, Dean,” he said softly, only loud enough for Dean to hear him and no one else. “You did so well. Someone else will take care of you now.”

“Cas—”

“Goodbye, Dean.”

He slipped out of the car, and was immediately swarmed by police. The flash of their lights felt like it was stabbing him in the eyes and he was getting a terrible headache now that Dean was in better hands.

It was a long night.

Sunday morning saw Cas, his father Chuck, his uncle Michael, Gabe’s sister Anna, Zachariah and Inias Adler, and two paralegals named Kevin and Channing all gathered into the conference room at the firm. Cas figured the reason that his aunt Amara wasn’t there was because she was sleeping off the chill pills that Michael had made her take to prevent her from making a scene at the police station in the middle of the night.

Cas envied her. He certainly hadn’t slept and had barely even had time to go home and shower and change into clothes that weren’t covered in blood and glitter before getting picked up and brought down to the office. He was chain-smoking at the window and Inias was being nice enough to keep a steady supply of coffee in his mug. It was doing nothing for his pounding headache, but he’d already taken all the aspirin he safely could. He wanted a joint more than anything in the world but he couldn’t do that shit in front of his dad or uncle. Anna and Zachariah had both already bummed smokes off him this morning, and he decided he was going to bail on this whole session whenever the pack ran out.

They had already decided on Aunt Naomi to represent Gabe because she was as cutthroat as they came and wasn’t technically a relative of his. She was Cas and Hester’s aunt by way of their estranged mother. Nobody had been able to get hold of Naomi yet but they’d left voicemails. With any luck, the case could be heard by Judge Anubis Saad because he and Chuck were golfing buddies, and Zachariah was promising to make a few calls to see if he could make that happen.

“Cas, how much did you tell the police?” Michael asked. “Be specific.”

“I told them the truth,” Cas said.

Most of them looked at him like he said he’d taken a shit in the coffee pot. Only Anna looked pale and grieved.

“Chuck, you’d better call Luke, you know he won’t listen to me,” Michael said.

“Why would you call Uncle Luke?” Cas muttered. “He’s police, he’s not gonna represent—oh.” He suddenly realized they’d ask Uncle Luke ‘lose’ his original statement and replace it with one where he’d been drunk and in shock, and had no idea what happened. “Never mind. Jesus.”

It was hardly the first time they’d tried to pull a similar stunt. He just somehow hadn’t expected it to ever be about him . The integrity of his word.

He leaned further out the window because he thought maybe he was going to be sick. The sun was bright and making his headache worse. He briefly remembered Dean touching a finger to the pinkened bridge of his nose and saying “ adorable” last night. Yeah, he was definitely going to be sick.

“Kevin, Channing, what did you find on precedent for getting this knocked down from felony to misdemeanor?” Michael asked. “Anything about first-time offenses?”

It was not, in fact, Gabe’s first criminal offense, but his priors were for drug possession, not DUI, and they’d gotten all but one of them expunged from his record anyway.

“It will be tricky because of the severely injured party,” Channing spoke up, “but I have a couple of files for you to look at.”

“Perfect, thank you.”

Naomi wouldn’t take kindly to having her work done for her, Cas thought dully as he flicked his cigarette butt out the window, feeling increasingly dizzy as he watched it fall six stories to the ground.

“‘Severely injured party’,” he repeated with a scoff.

“What was that, son?” Chuck asked sharply, turning to look at him.

“Nothing, sir,” Cas said immediately, even though he already knew it was too late. He just had to run his big, fat mouth.

“Don’t be like that, Cas, we need you on this team. What did you say?”

His father was not going to be placated, so Cas might as well go all-in. “The severely injured party is named Dean Winchester.”

“What on earth does it matter?” Chuck asked, clearly baffled. “All we need to know is that he’s not dead , so there’s a chance we can keep your cousin from becoming a felon.”

Anna was refusing to look at Cas. She was the only one in the room who knew, because she’d been there last night and seen Cas and Dean come out of the bathroom together. He didn’t know why she was keeping his secret. She wasn’t usually that nice.

“No, sure, why would Gabe need to be a felon if he’s only responsible for shattering a man’s femur and patella and dislocating his pelvis and puncturing his lung? Clearly that’s misdemeanor territory,” Cas said, feeling like he couldn’t get a proper breath and like his pounding headache was driving him mad. He stood up too fast from the windowsill and the dizzy feeling got worse. He had to catch himself on a chair. The lights above the conference table were an abomination that was ramping up his headache to even greater heights. “Never mind the six stitches in Ruby’s forehead, her sprained wrist, Jody Mills’s dislocated shoulder, literally everybody in that car having whiplash and neck strain, and fuck, I think I have a concussion. By the way.”

His father was staring at him with his nostrils flared and his eyebrows drawn up and his eyes like chips of ice in his face. It was a look Cas had a long history with, and he waited impassively for his father’s hand to fall on him.

“You need to calm down, kid,” Zachariah said, shifting his weight in a way that looked casual but put him just very slightly in front of Chuck, so that Chuck would need to bump into him if he wanted to go to Cas. “You had a weird night, maybe you’re not thinking clearly.”

“He needs to go to the hospital,” Anna said, already standing up and grabbing her purse. “Didn’t you hear him? He has a concussion. I’ll drive him.”

“Why didn’t you get checked out by the paramedics then?” Inias asked curiously.

Cas willed himself to puke on Inias, but couldn’t conjure it up. He just brushed past them all and followed Anna to the elevator, feeling his father’s cold stare on the back of his neck the entire time.

“Oh my god, Cas, that was the closest I think I’ve ever come to wanting to strangle you,” she gasped as soon as the elevator doors closed them in. “Are you insane?”

Cas slumped against the mirrored wall. “Maybe it’s the TBI,” he muttered.

“And provoking your dad to hit you will improve that how exactly?”

Cas waved a weary hand. “Whatever. He hasn’t done that since I was nineteen.”

“Yeah, because you haven’t given him a reason since then. I know you have no sense of self-preservation, but was the dick really that good?”

Cas snapped to attention. “Fuck you.”

She looked surprised. “Sorry. That was uncalled for.”

“You think?”

“Look, Cas, I know you liked the guy but I also know you didn’t even ask for his number. And yeah, Gabe obviously fucked up, but you know as well as anybody that it’s not exactly easy to be a member of this family and he doesn’t deal with the pressure as well as you and I do.”

How well Anna dealt with the pressure was up for debate, Cas thought but didn’t say. They exited the elevator and Cas was digging his sunglasses out of his pocket and putting them on before they stepped out to find Anna’s car. It didn’t help his headache as much as he would have liked.

“Don’t give me some sob story about how Gabe didn’t get enough hugs and that’s why he has to be a cokehead who cheats on his wife every chance he gets. I know he’s your brother, but even you know he’s a huge dickbag. We’ve gotten him out of so much shit already and he never learns. He has earned what’s coming for him.”

“Don’t,” Anna said, reaching into her purse angrily and yanking out a pack of tissues. She blotted at her tears like they were offensive to her. “Yeah, he is my brother, and you’re my cousin, and we’re all completely messed up people, including the Roché cousins. Gabe isn’t worse than the rest of us, he just wears it more on his sleeve. He doesn’t deserve to go to jail.”

“Nobody deserves to go to jail, jail is fucking bullshit,” Cas snorted. “But Gabe deserves to have the same thing happen to him that happens to everyone else who drives drunk and almost kills a bunch of people.”

“That attitude is going to get you far at this firm,” Anna said dryly, still blotting tears carefully and trying not to ruin her mascara.

“Yeah, I know,” Cas said sourly.

“Maybe we should run away and go start our own practice,” she said.

It was the kind of thing that Cas would normally ignore or even laugh at, but she wasn’t even looking at him. She was looking at her own reflection in the glass of her window, and her lips were trembling.

“Anna,” Cas murmured.

“No, shut up and get in the car,” she said. “We’re not talking anymore. I’m taking you to the hospital.”

“They can’t even do anything for me at the hospital,” Cas said. “I can already tell it’s just a mild concussion.”

“You had better have a hospital bill to show your dad if you want to get out of the stunt you pulled back there. Besides, I’m taking you to Marina del Rey. That’s where they admitted your boytoy.”

“Why would that matter?”

“I figured you’d want to visit him.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I am the very last person he would want to see right now.”

“Well, see or don’t see him, but that’s where you’re getting your head checked out,” Anna said stubbornly.

They rode the rest of the way in silence.

Cas got diagnosed with a moderate concussion and was given a prescription for painkillers and some advice he paid no attention to. He found out what room Dean was in and promised Anna he’d get a different ride home so she could take off.

As soon as she was out of sight he texted Ruby and told her to keep an eye on Anna for a couple of days, at least until her boyfriend got back from his trip. She was overdue for a sleeping pill overdose or a self-harm incident and having her brother in jail waiting for a bail hearing wasn’t exactly conducive to her stability. She and Ruby pretended to barely tolerate one another, but he thought maybe Ruby cared enough to keep her distracted and high on something sensible until she leveled out.

Then he spent a further ten minutes pacing in front of the ER with his last cigarette, trying to decide between seeing Dean or simply going home to smoke some weed and get some sleep. There was nothing to say to Dean, really, and it wasn’t like he or Dean actually owed each other anything. There would inevitably be consequences if his father found out he’d done something that could harm Gabe’s defense, too.

Cas eventually accepted the fact that he was just here because wanted to see with his own eyes that Dean was going to be okay. Which was dangerously sentimental and kind of pathetic. But yeah, that was what he wanted. If Dean wanted to be angry at him, that was fine, too. Maybe even better than fine. Maybe getting yelled at would help him shake off the rebellious feeling that had gripped him in the conference room and made him act out, and he could go back to trying to be the dutiful, reliable son who didn’t need to think about this anymore.

He hit Dean Winchester’s hospital room at something of a determined stride, shoulders already braced for the worst, and was pulled up short by the sight of a tall, rangy younger guy sitting at Dean’s bedside wearing a rumpled, red flannel shirt and holding a paperback book in his hands.

“Oh. Sorry,” Cas said awkwardly. “I just wanted to see how he was doing.”

“You a friend of Dean’s?”

“Sort of. We only met last night.”

“Oh,” the guy said, setting the book aside and reaching up to tuck his chin-length hair behind an ear. “Are you the one who sat in the car with him until the ambulance got there?”

“Yes,” he said, deeply surprised that this guy knew about that.

“Dean was asking about you.”

“He was?” Cas asked in shock, his eyes going from Dean’s companion to Dean himself. There were bandages on his face where the glass had been last night, and there was deep bruising around it. His bed was raised about halfway to keep him propped up to help his lung heal, and oxygen puffed steadily through a cannula under his nose. His leg was in a heavy-duty frame contraption of some kind with pins poking out of it.

“He just came out of surgery right around the time I got here,” the guy continued. “They woke him up for a minute to make sure he came out of anesthesia okay, and he asked right away if you got hurt and where you were.”

“Did he…?” Cas looked away. “Did he remember that I was in the car that hit him?”

The guy stood up. “He didn’t say anything about that.”

“Well, I was,” Cas said sourly. “I wasn’t the driver, that was my dumbfuck cousin.”

“I’m Dean’s brother Sam,” the guy said, but his face was very guarded now, and he was steadily shuffling his remarkably tall frame a little further in front of Dean.

“I’m Cas Shurley. Listen, I just came because… I feel terrible about what happened and I wanted to apologize. It’s not my fault, but I don’t believe for a minute you’re gonna get that from anyone else in my family, least of all from the asshole who actually did this, and I thought… somebody should.”

“Dean’s hurt really bad, you know that?” Sam said, his face solemn and unaccepting.

“Yes. I know.”

Another round of dizziness hit Cas, and he stumbled into the tiny ensuite bathroom to puke. He hadn’t eaten in twenty-four hours, and all that came up was a bitter, sour rush of coffee. He had to stay on his knees for a couple minutes afterward because he didn’t think he could get up.

“Hey, are you… good?” Dean’s brother asked uncomfortably from where he still stood next to Dean’s bed.

“Just a concussion,” Cas groaned. “Maybe low blood sugar. It was a long night.”

“You haven’t slept or eaten anything?” Sam’s voice softened a little.

“Not yet,” Cas said, eyes closed and kneeling in front of a hospital toilet and feeling like a fucking idiot. “Should probably go ask a nurse if I can get a toothbrush or something.”

“I’ll do it,” Sam said. “You just hang there for a second.”

Cas was deeply looking forward to going home and getting high as fuck so he could stop thinking about the fact that he needed to go back to the same conference room tomorrow and do his job. He would have just snuck out of the room and disappeared while Sam was distracted if he thought he could get up.

Instead, he had to deal with a concerned nurse with the promised toothbrush calling down to the ER, confirming he’d already been treated there, highly recommending he didn’t go home alone and asking if there was anyone he could go stay with.

He could call Meg. He didn’t want to explain everything to her right now, so he wasn’t going to call her, but there was someone he could stay with, so he said ‘yes’ when asked. The nurse brought him a pudding cup and told him to eat it before he left.

So Cas sat in a pool of cold sweat and shame in Dean’s hospital room while Dean’s brother openly stared at him devouring a pudding cup in about three seconds flat. Sam opened his mouth to say something, but whatever it was died on his tongue because Dean groaned and moved his hand.

“Dean!” Sam whirled toward him immediately, and Cas tensed.

Dean’s eyes fluttered open, and he immediately grimaced and let out a coughing, keening cry of pain.

“Oh shit,” he said in a raspy tone, and blinked up at his brother in surprise. “Sam?”

“Yeah, man, I’m right here.”

“Charlie?”

“Sent her home for some rest. She’ll be back later,” Sam said, leaning close and putting his hand on Dean’s arm where it wouldn’t disturb his IV or finger monitor. “Dad’s offloading his open jobs to other mechanics in the area as fast as he can, and he and Mom are trying to get here by tomorrow.”

“Okay,” Dean said shakily. He turned his head and his eyes went wider when he saw Cas sitting on his other side. “Oh.”

Cas felt something in him trying to cringe, but outwardly he held himself rigidly straight. “Hello, Dean.”

Dean managed a tiny, weak smile at him. “Wasn’t expecting to see you, Castiel.”

“I’ll go,” he said, jumping to his feet.

“No,” Dean said immediately. “Didn’t mean it like that. S’good to see you.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Sure I do,” Dean said, but then he grimaced again and coughed again. “Ah, shit.”

“I’m so sorry, Dean,” Cas said, gripping the back of the chair he’d been sitting in until his knuckles were white. “I didn’t know Gabe was—I was trying to get him to pull over, I distracted him, this was my fault—”

Every ounce of legal training he had was screaming at him to not say these things, but he didn’t care. He just didn’t.

“It’s okay,” Dean mumbled, blinking at him with tears of pain in his eyes. “Just glad I get to say thanks for staying with me. Was freaking out so much, but you helped.”

Cas nodded, and felt, to his horror, that he was about to start crying, too. It was instinctual to dig his nails into his palms and focus on the feeling until the urge passed. Crying had never once helped him in any way.

“I’m glad that I could help,” he said carefully. “I just came to see how you were, and to apologize. I’ll go now.”

“Castiel,” Dean said firmly.

“Yes?”

“You can leave if you want to, but you don’t… have to.”

Sam was silent at Dean’s side with his eyebrows trying to climb into his hairline, and Cas felt his face heat up as Sam stared at him.

“I can stay a little longer,” Cas said cautiously.

“Don’t you need sleep?” Sam asked bluntly. “And food?”

Cas sat back down and smirked at Dean’s confused, concerned look. “I just finished law school, I promise it’s not my first all-nighter.”

“You also have a concussion?”

“Not my first of those either,” Cas said, because he was exhausted and stupid and forgetting that he wasn’t talking to one of his cousins. “Anyway, Dean, I promise you won’t be awake for long. I’ll just stay until you fall asleep.”

“Okay,” Dean said, and Cas could tell he was already starting to flag. “Thanks.”

Chapter Text

Dean left the courtroom and hobbled to the bathroom down the hall, shoes and crutches squeaking on the expensive tiles. Crowley had turned to him as soon as the gavel had come down like he wanted to chat about what had just happened, but the back of Dean’s neck was crawling from being watched by the eyes of Gabriel Milton’s family and he just needed to get out. There was such naked, cold disinterest from all of them that left him shivering.

All except Castiel Shurley. Dean hadn’t even known he was there until it was over. Dean was rushing to leave and spotted him near the back of the room with his face grim and hollow. Castiel had gotten to his feet when Dean’s eyes met his, and made a move as if to follow him. At the same time, someone had shouted out “Cas!” in a hard, angry voice, and the guy had frozen in place.

Dean couldn’t move very fast—his physical therapy was going well but the pain in his hip, thigh, and knee was still pretty constant, and he still didn’t have much feeling at all below the knee—but he managed to move fast enough to lock himself in the disabled toilet stall before anyone else thought to follow him.

Dean grabbed a handful of toilet paper and used it to dab at the sweat on his forehead and neck. He couldn’t breathe. The trial was over too abruptly, too dramatically. A sonorous declaration and the sharp bang of polished wood on polished wood, and that was all. It felt goddamn anticlimactic.

Gabe Milton had to serve another month of time in jail on top of the two he’d already spent, he had to do some community service when he got out, and he owed Dean two months of back wages for the time Dean had taken off from work at Guidry’s. But nothing more than that, no matter how much Crowley gestured and growled. Naomi fucking Roché had successfully argued that acting and modeling jobs were gig work and already not guaranteed income. The insurance was a quagmire that should eventually resolve into Dean’s hospital and PT bills being covered, but it wasn’t going to be enough. Dean didn’t make enough at the theater to keep paying his rent.

Kansas loomed over him like the shadow of some great beast. Fuck, what was he going to tell Charlie?

Dean was just breathing through the panic and nausea when the bathroom door opened again, and he heard scuffling footsteps and grunting that made him perversely wonder if somebody had just come crashing in here for sex.

But something banged hard—against the paper towel dispenser, judging by the metallic clattering noise—and a hoarse voice let out a short, muffled cry of pain.

“Shut up!” hissed a voice that sounded familiar to Dean. “Are you happy now?”

Silence.

“Answer me. Are you?” the same voice demanded.

“No, sir,” answered a second voice Dean thought he recognized.

“Well you should be, because this is what you wanted. Your cousin in jail, getting divorced, having his finances sucked dry just because you had to open your stupid mouth. What do you have to say for yourself?”

“Nothing, sir,” the second voice said, and Dean suddenly placed it. Castiel Shurley. That was Castiel’s voice, but soft and meek and placating. It sounded wrong on him. Not that Dean could judge. He didn’t actually know him. He’d sucked his dick three months ago and talked to him for ten minutes in a hospital room the day after. It didn’t mean anything.

“Don’t give me that, Cas. You decided to pull one of your pig-headed, stupid little acts of rebellion, and now you have to face the consequences.”

“Because I refused to perjure myself?” Castiel asked, voice losing its meekness. Dean couldn’t exactly say Castiel suddenly sounded defiant—more like tired.

“Don’t fucking interrupt me.”

Dean heard the unmistakable sound of flesh striking flesh, and he wanted to throw up. Sweat was beading his forehead again. Jesus. He should do something. He recognized the first voice now; Chuck Shurley was out there apparently going for a Father of the Year award.

Dean had to do something instead of just standing there listening like a fucking creep. He reached out for the lock on the stall, made sure he was as secure on his crutches as possible. He wasn’t capable of holding his own in a fight, but maybe they’d stop if they knew they had an audience.

“We can’t do this here,” Castiel said, still sounding odd. Like he was weary, or bored. Who fucking sounded like that when they were getting hurt?

“You don’t tell me, I tell you,” Chuck hissed. There was another clattering bang, then it went quiet. “We’ll talk about this later.”

The bathroom door opened again, letting in the sounds of scuffing feet and clamoring voices from the hallway. Then it shut, and Dean figured they had gone.

He needed to wash his face, then he needed to find Crowley because his lawyer was his ride home. He unlocked the stall door and swung it open and saw Castiel still standing there by one of the hand washing sinks, dabbing at his lip with a paper towel with his suit jacket hung over one arm. The guy turned around slowly when he heard Dean behind him. He widened his stance, drew back his shoulders, and lifted his chin. It was like watching a car turn into a Transformer. Impenetrable, intimidating.

“Hello, Dean.”

“Hey, Castiel,” Dean said dumbly.

“I’ll assume you overheard most of that, and go straight to asking whether you could just… mind your own business.”

Dean looked into Castiel’s striking eyes, unable to ignore the heavy bags under them or how pale he’d become since Dean had last seen him three months ago, and tried to gauge the right thing to do. Castiel seemed calm and not really hurt other than the split lip that was already starting to swell. He met Dean’s gaze without a hint of embarrassment.

Dean sighed. “Sure,” he said, and carefully limped to the sink at the other end of the row of four. “So your family’s not big on truth or justice, huh?”

Castiel seemed to find that funny because he chuckled, low and smoky. “More like they think they get to decide what those terms mean.”

“And you?” Dean asked, wetting a couple of paper towels to wipe his face.

“I think that my aunt won the case about your missing income fair and square by having the superior legal argument,” Castiel said while white-knuckling the edges of the sink and staring at his own face in the mirror. “And that sucks. I’m sorry.”

“Oh, great, if you’re sorry.”

“What would you have me do, exactly?” Castiel asked, straightening up to look at him again. “Feel free to be specific.”

Dean didn’t have an answer for that, so he just tossed his paper towels in the bin and turned to go. But then he saw the spotting of blood on the back of Castiel’s white dress shirt. He must have been slammed into the paper towels pretty hard.

“Hey, uh, did you know that you’re bleeding?”

“You don’t say,” Castiel said in a dry voice, blotting at his lip.

“No, um, here,” Dean said, pointing at but not touching his shoulder.

“Ah,” Castiel said, still acting weirdly calm about the whole thing. “Thank you.” He put his jacket back on, covering the bloodstain. “Problem solved.”

Dean should just go, probably. He needed to figure out where Crowley was. Leaning his weight on his left side, he carefully slipped his right arm out of the forearm cuff so he could get his phone out of his pocket to check it. He had to lean the right crutch against the sink and hope it didn’t fall.

Castiel was watching him curiously as he maneuvered through the song and dance of life on crutches. Dean felt his cheeks heating up and channeled it all to anger. If he seemed pathetic to Castiel, then so what? They both knew why things were like this.

He looked down at his phone and saw a missed text from Crowley, stating that if Dean didn’t meet him at the entrance doors in three minutes he would leave without him.

“Shit,” he muttered. At the speed he moved, that wasn’t an option. He thumbed the call button. When Crowley picked up, he growled, “Crowley, don’t you fucking dare leave without me.”

“Already gone, gimpy. You snooze, you lose. I have places to be. Get a cab.”

“Are you serious?” Dean breathed out, closing his eyes. “You fucking shithead.”

“Love you, too,” the man’s raspy voice laughed. “You’re welcome, by the way, for, you know, defending you in court and all.”

Dean hung up on him and barely restrained himself from throwing his phone across the room. He did slam his hand down on the soap dispenser and nearly broke it off the wall. From the corner of his eye, he saw Castiel flinch.

“Shit,” Dean muttered. “Sorry.”

“Your lawyer ditched you?”

“Yeah, he’s kind of a dick. Weird guy. Represented me for free just because he hates your family so much.”

Castiel had a faint smile on his face. “Very weird.”

“It’s not like I can drive myself,” Dean said, making a vague gesture at his leg trapped in a bulky knee brace. “And even if I could, my car’s in Kansas in my dad’s shop.”

“I’m sorry,” Castiel said.

Dean lifted his head with his mouth open, temper on a fraying thread. He was sick of people saying that, and he’d already snapped at Castiel about it. It was a useless fucking thing to say. But Castiel’s furrowed forehead, soft mouth, and wide eyes made it seem like he was actually sorry. Besides, the only thing yelling would accomplish right now would be making Dean feel even more like shit. 

“It’s whatever,” Dean said.

“If I got an Uber for you, would you accept it?” Castiel asked. “I’d offer to drive you, but I’m also getting an Uber.”

It had never occurred to Dean to wonder if a grown-ass man knew how to drive or had a car, but now he did. “You don’t drive?”

“Sometimes,” Castiel said evasively.

“What’s that mean?”

Castiel smiled at him with the grossest, fakest smile Dean had seen in a while. “I mean I took a lot of Ativan right before the hearing. I’m not as stupid as Gabe, so I won’t be getting behind the wheel in this condition.”

The weird amount of calm suddenly made more sense, at least.

“Good for you,” Dean said. “But I’m not, like, an actual charity case. I can get my own Uber.”

Castiel suddenly tipped his head to the side. “Do you smoke?”

“Cigarettes or weed?”

“Either,” Castiel said.

“I got a prescription, actually. Pain management stuff. Supposed to save the Oxy for when it’s real bad, so I don’t get addicted.”

“Great. There’s a food truck around the corner that makes the best tacos al pastor in the city. You want to get high and eat some tacos before you go home?”

“With you?” Dean asked in disbelief.

Castiel quickly looked away, but not before Dean could see the flash of hurt in them. “Sorry. That was a stupid thing to ask.”

Dean couldn’t believe he was actually thinking about this, but he was. He was probably going to get high when he got home, anyway. Tacos were hard to say no to, and sitting down for a while would help dial down the amount of pain he was in. At first, it was strange to Dean that Castiel was asking him to lunch at all, but it was becoming clear that Castiel needed to find something he could do for Dean: maybe this was his way of pivoting after Dean turned down the Uber. Considering what had just happened with his dad, he probably felt guilty and was looking to do penance, even though Dean had told him months ago that Dean didn’t blame him. So Dean was feeling kind of sorry for him, and wanted to throw him a bone.

“Actually, it sounds kinda good,” Dean said. “I fucking love tacos.”

Castiel’s answering smile was endearingly shy.

“Can you get the door for me?” Dean asked, threading his right arm back into his crutch.

“Of course,” Castiel said, hurrying to open it.

“Hey, uh, should we like, leave separately and meet up at the truck?”

Castiel tipped his head to the side again to give Dean a searching look. “That’s a very polite way of asking if my father would be upset if he sees us together.”

Dean flushed, but didn’t apologize. “I thought so.”

“He’s long gone,” was how Castiel chose to answer. “Let’s go.”

It was wonderful to exit the cold and echoing halls of the courthouse and into the sunshine. Dean tipped his face up for a moment with a long sigh of pleasure. He had lived here for over two years and he still couldn’t get over the fact that he could stand outside in a hoodie in November. It was probably cold as shit in Kansas and here he was, watching palm trees drift in the breeze coming off the ocean.

He never wanted to go back.

He might not have a choice.

“How far is it?” Dean asked plaintively as they made their way down the ramp that switchbacked near the stairs to the street. His whole right side was agony. “Ah, fuck, I should have used the wheelchair today.”

“Why didn’t you?” Castiel asked him, shuffling at his side without a word of complaint about how slow Dean was.

“Crowley told me I needed to look pathetic but still resilient. Besides, would you show up to court in a wheelchair if you could show up on crutches?”

“I’ve never had occasion to wonder.”

“Yeah, well, feel free to ditch my ass if you get bored waiting for me.”

Castiel frowned. Deeply. “Is that supposed to be funny?”

Dean felt his stomach kind of squirm. His jokes not landing was never a good feeling. He was just trying to keep it light and somehow he’d made it heavy. “Never mind.”

“I get the feeling you’d be very offended if I offered to carry you.”

“I’d be too amused to be offended,” Dean answered. “Since there’s no way you even could.”

“Would you like to test that?” Castiel asked, raising an eyebrow and somehow, without actually doing anything, calling attention to the breadth of his shoulders.

Dean froze. He wasn’t thinking about the bathroom at Purgatory. He was not experiencing a sudden wave of lust. He just… wasn’t. Couldn’t.

“Not really,” he said, and focused on his feet for a while.

“Dean, not to be invasive or indelicate, but can I ask if this is permanent? The level of mobility you’re at?”

“I really hope not,” Dean said. “My care team thinks I’m on the right track. I just have a lot of healing and physical therapy that I still need to do. I’m a little behind because I had a setback.”

“What happened?”

“Pushed myself on therapy too hard, too soon and my lung collapsed again,” Dean mumbled. He still felt stupid about it. Charlie had been terrified and had channeled it into being so mad at him that she barely talked to him for a week, helping him stretch and get dressed and giving him rides to work in total silence. “I’m good now, though. Shouldn’t happen again. In another few months I might be all the way back to normal.” A bitter laugh bubbled out of him. “Well, you know. Except for my face.”

“What’s wrong with your face?” Castiel asked.

Dean stopped walking altogether to stare at him. “You’re kidding, right?”

There was no missing or avoiding the scar. Dean put cream on it every day, and it did help with the inflammation and color, but there was only so much that could be done. The thing stretched nearly from his hairline to his lip. He was incredibly lucky, he’d been told, that he’d kept his eye. It was some kind of miracle, apparently. It didn’t feel very miraculous.

Castiel grimaced, seeming to realize he’d fucked up. “I meant, is there a mobility issue there?”

“Oh,” Dean said awkwardly. “No, uh. A little numbness in my cheek, but overall fine. Just you, know, destroyed my career is all.”

“What?”

“I talked to my agent the other day. He’s uh, not optimistic about my chances for stardom these days.”

“It’s just a scar,” Castiel said. “Is that supposed to make you less astonishingly attractive?”

Dean flushed, but he also felt sick with anger. Did Castiel think he had to say this to make Dean feel better or something?

“Is that why you agreed that your shithead cousin doesn’t owe me money? Because you think jobs are just piling up for me? Nobody’s even sure I’m going to walk without aids ever again. A guy on crutches with a huge scar on his face is not exactly leading man material. It’s not even quirky best friend material. It’s fucking… uncredited guy in the background in a war movie. Maybe I can get two minutes on a medical drama or something.”

“I’m sorry, Dean,” Castiel said mechanically.

“Yeah, sure, you sound sorry.”

“It’s the fucking benzos,” Castiel said, rubbing a hand over his face. “I needed them so I didn’t crawl out of my skin back there. I’ll apologize again when they wear off.”

“Don’t bother,” Dean said. He would have ditched him, but they had already made it to the taco truck by then. “Just change the subject. Hold this,” he said, and handed Castiel his right crutch so he could fish his stash out of his pocket. He retrieved a joint and a couple of gummies. “Here, you want one?”

“Fuck, yes,” Castiel said immediately.

They both ate a gummy and took a couple of hits each off Dean’s joint so they could get the high going while waiting for the edible to kick in. Dean saw a couple of long picnic tables, most seats already claimed by people in drab suits. “I’m gonna go grab a seat before they’re gone. Get me tacos.”

“How many? What kind?”

“Yes,” Dean said, and hobbled over to the tables, leaving Castiel standing in line looking confused. He laughed as he made his way over to a table, but then he realized the only seats available were right in the middle of the rows of tables. There was no way he could do it. He could sit backward, maybe, but then it would be hard to eat. “Life sucks and then you die,” he muttered. He leaned against a tree and waited for Cas, who had already ordered and was handing over a payment card in the time it took Dean to walk over to the tables. Maybe they could go find somewhere else to eat.

Castiel turned around, saw him, and frowned. He surveyed the situation quickly, then strode right past Dean, the open lapels of his jacket flapping, and approached the pair of people at the end of one table.

“Please move in and make some space at the end,” he said in his flat, medicated tone.

The man and woman, both well-dressed, looked up at him with twinned cold looks. “Just take a free seat,” the woman said.

Castiel’s glaring expression didn’t change as he pointed at Dean. “If you think he can get his leg over the bench, you’re an idiot. He needs to sit on the end.”

“Oh my god,” Dean whispered, mortified.

They turned in surprise to look at Dean, then looked at each other. The man suddenly stood up and scooped up his paper wrappers and paper plate into his hands. “You know, we’re actually done,” he said.

The woman also scrambled up, and both of them beat a hasty retreat back toward the courthouse. Castiel looked over at Dean and cocked his head at the bench.

“Holy shit,” Dean said as he approached. “You’re an asshole.”

“It was a reasonable request,” Castiel said, unbothered. “It’s not my fault if they took offense to it. Let me help you,” he added as Dean started to sit down with his leg stretched out to the side, his balance wavering. He caught Dean under the arm with one hand and put the other across his back, warm and broad, and Dean sank into the seat with his cheeks on fire.

“Sorry,” Dean muttered.

“You don’t have anything to be sorry about. I have to go get our food, but I’ll be right back.”

Castiel came back with a dreamy expression that said the marijuana was working, juggling two overloaded plates with bright-colored bottles of Jarritos tucked under each arm.

“I got a few different things for you to try,” Castiel said as he set the plate in front of Dean. “Tacos al pastor, as promised, barbacoa mulitas, and tostadas de pollo.” He named them with the lyrical, rolling pronunciation of someone who actually spoke Spanish, which meant Dean barely understood what he said, but he didn’t care what it all was since it looked fucking incredible. Meat was piled high and everything was garnished liberally with shaved pineapple and fresh salsa. Dean had been too tense to eat since sometime yesterday. The edible hadn’t even kicked in yet, but the joint had muted enough of his pain and stoked his appetite enough that his mouth started watering like crazy.

“Watermelon or lime?” Castiel asked as he held out the sodas.

“Damn, Castiel, why don’t you just ask me to marry you?” Dean moaned, grabbing the watermelon flavor.

Castiel, thank fuck, actually found that funny, and laughed as he sat down on the other side of the table. “This isn’t even how I impress somebody. I should take you to my favorite sushi place.”

“Please, no,” Dean said, wrinkling his nose. “I can’t do the raw fish thing. You can take the man out of Kansas but you can’t take the Kansas out of the man, or something.”

“Well, hopefully salsa doesn’t offend your Midwestern sensibilities,” Castiel said, raising his bright-green soda bottle to clink against Dean’s.

“I’ll live,” Dean said eagerly, and shoved half a taco into his mouth. “Oh my fucking god,” he said, mumbling it around the food.

Castiel laughed again. “Right?” he asked.

Taking off his tie, Castiel carefully rolled it up before sticking it into his jacket pocket. Dean watched his hands the whole time, remembering the size and nimbleness all too perfectly well. A bite of food got stuck in his throat at the memory. He coughed and covered it up with a gulp of soda. Castiel was looking at him with a smirk on his face, those damn hands poised to pick up a taco, when Dean could finally come up for air.

“Are you okay?”

“Eat your fucking taco,” Dean said.

The edibles hit them both within a couple minutes of each other as they were finishing their food, which meant that instead of going their separate ways, Castiel went to another food truck two spaces down to get decadent and overloaded ice cream cones; cookie dough for Dean and Vietnamese coffee-flavored for himself. He let Dean try it, and Dean had to grudgingly admit that it was pretty good, even if he preferred his own cookie-laden monstrosity.

They talked for longer than they meant to. Dean knew a weird amount about Castiel’s family by now from having to navigate the court case, and Castiel seemed to want to even the scale, asking Dean about his parents and brother and friends. Castiel had grown up in L.A. and found the slow pace of life Dean had grown up with perversely interesting. The fact that Dean had actually gone cow tipping in high school had Castiel giggling like an idiot, although that could probably be chalked up to the fact that he was totally stoned by then.

Eventually, the need for Dean to go home and do his range-of-motion exercises and stretches so his leg wouldn’t be even worse tomorrow won out, and he declared that he needed to get going. Castiel looked almost sad, but he immediately opened the Uber app on his phone nonetheless.

“I’m paying for your ride,” he said firmly. “My family sucks and you don’t have any money.”

“You don’t have to do that,” Dean said. “You already bought me lunch.”

“I want to,” Castiel said, staring at him for way too long. Dean chickened out and looked away first.

“Yeah, okay,” he mumbled. “Thanks, Castiel.”

“It’s still weird that you call me that. Nobody calls me that.”

Dean wiped a hand over his mouth, feeling like he couldn’t look at him. Castiel was just here to make up for his shitty family. He didn’t need to know Dean’s head was stuck three months ago in a club bathroom.

“Well, it’s a cool name, so unless you hate it, I’m gonna keep doing it,” Dean said.

Castiel had a soft, drowsy smile on his face. “I don’t hate it.”

“No, it’s still weird,” Charlie declared as she pulled his leg in a careful horizontal pivot toward her. “Guilt is one thing, but tacos and ice cream are something else.”

“Stop,” Dean said as pain spiked, and she immediately froze in place with one hand on his thigh and the other on his ankle.

“Nice!” she cheered. “That’s way better than last week.” She carefully helped him bring his leg back to the center. Still flat on his back, Dean lifted his hand for the enthusiastic high five she was holding out. “Okay, next one.”

They did ten reps, then he sat up so he could do his heel and toe taps. Charlie sat next to him and handed him a bottle of water.

“I know he’s hot or whatever, but his family is so garbage and I think he might be kind of a fuck up,” Charlie said, watching Dean’s bare feet with him.

“Oh, believe me, I noticed.”

“So why are you giving him the time of day?”

“I’m not. He just… he wanted to do something nice for me, and his dad had literally just hit him in the fucking face for having the audacity to not lie about what happened. It didn’t seem like a big deal to let him get it out of his system.”

Charlie had still been at work yesterday when Dean got home, pulling some extra hours so she could leave for the weekend early and go have a crazy sex marathon weekend in Vegas with Stevie, her current girlfriend. Hence, this was the first chance Dean had to tell her what he’d done after the hearing yesterday.

“Okay,” she said doubtfully, pulling a face at him. “But that’s it, right? You’re not going to stay in touch with him or anything.”

“Right,” Dean said, sweating bullets as he tried to get his heel up again. He ignored the stupid, knotty feeling of disappointment at the idea of never seeing Castiel again. “The sciatic nerve is fucking bullshit, for the record.”

Charlie gave him a soft punch on the shoulder. “Whatever, you’re kicking its ass.”

“It literally is in my ass, Charlie. My saggy, out of shape ass.”

“Hey, in my very objective opinion your ass looks fine. You’re a sexy beast.”

“Don’t, okay?” Dean muttered, looking down at his leg. He was doing his exercises in his underwear because it was easier to not have to change pants again before work, but he’d been trying not to look at the horror show of bared skin.

The worst scar was the one on his thigh; it was a long, mangled, twisting thing that kept the record of where the door of his car had buried itself into his flesh. The puncture wounds of the stitches that closed it were still visible in neat rows marching up either side. There were surgical scars from trying to put the bone back together, too, and another on his belly where they’d had to go in and remove his ruptured appendix. Maybe he could eventually get back his muscle definition and his tan, but the scars weren’t going anywhere.

They both knew his career was over. Charlie just wasn’t willing to admit it yet.

“Dean,” Charlie said, and took his hand. “You’re doing amazing, and it’s going to get better.”

If anyone else said it, Dean would yell at them. But Charlie was different. In the past few months, she’d gone from being just a roommate to being his best friend. She’d been here, day in and day out. Keeping him supplied with food and drinks, books and company when he was basically bedridden; doing his laundry; helping him with PT exercises; helping him put his shoes on. If Charlie hadn’t been willing to step up to do all of that, Dean would have had to have to argue with Gabe Milton’s insurance company about paying for a home nurse, or he would have had to move back to Kansas already.

Dean closed his eyes, and leaned over so she could hug him and put her head on his shoulder. He rested his cheek into her hair. “If you say so,” he murmured. “You’re the smartest person in the world; you’d know.”

“Damn straight,” she said. After a moment, she leaned back to pat him on both cheeks. “Look lively, cadet. We gotta get you into some pants and get you to work.”

“Sir, yes, sir,” Dean said, saluting her. He let her thread a pair of pants over his feet and up to his thighs, then used the grab bar that his dad had installed next to his bed to haul himself up to his feet and tug them the rest of the way on. He had to be careful with the waistband and fly, because his surgery scars were still kind of sensitive.

Charlie drove him down to the theater and reminded him that she was going to Stevie’s place tonight before hitting the airport early tomorrow morning, and wouldn’t see him again until Tuesday.

“I know,” Dean said, waving her off. “Have fun, you animal.”

“And you’ll call Jody and Donna if you need something,” she said sternly, pointing a finger at him.

“Yeah, Charlie, of course.”

“Good. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do, princess,” she said, and drove away.

Dean was still wearing a fond smile on his face when he shambled past the box office and nodded at Krissy.

“What is that face?” she muttered. “It’s creepy when you’re happy, Winchester.”

“And you’re a joy to be around, Chambers,” Dean rejoined. “Don’t know why Benny lets you speak to customers.”

“You volunteering to take over?”

“Not on your life,” he said, and shoved the door open with his shoulder.

His smile didn’t dissipate as he walked through the old-Hollywood splendor of Guidry’s lobby area with its patterned carpet, art deco lighting, and ostentatious crown molding. It always had a faintly musty smell, but the owner, some grandkid of the original Guidry, spared no expense in keeping it in great condition, and Benny was an awesome manager who didn’t hire anybody who didn’t love and respect the theater’s history. There weren’t any customers around yet, since there weren’t any shows starting for another hour, but Benny was behind the bar, polishing it up and stocking glassware.

“Hey, Benny,” Dean greeted.

“Hey, yourself,” Benny said with a smile. He hustled out from behind the bar to come take Dean’s bag off him and carry it for him to the employee locker room. “Sure is nice to have you around again.”

“Well, with service like this, why would I go anywhere else?” Dean chuckled. Benny’s chivalry was cute when it wasn’t goddamn annoying. His first week back at work, he felt like he’d suddenly grown an overbearing conjoined twin with the way Benny had hovered. “Thanks, man.”

“Gotta keep my MVP happy,” Benny said.

There weren’t many people around who still knew how to handle and repair 35 mm film reels and projectors, so Dean was invaluable enough to still have a job after having to take two months off. Benny and Dean had made a plan to start training Krissy, but it had been seriously delayed by Dean’s accident. They should talk about it again, although Dean knew it was tough to find the money for overtime and an extra employee to replace Krissy on the ticket booth and concession stand.

“I got to finish getting the bar stocked and make sure Aidan’s set up for concessions,” Benny said while Dean fiddled around with hanging up his jacket and pocketing a few things from his bag. “Take a radio and let me know if you need anything, brother.”

“You got it,” Dean said.

There was an old, tiny, clunky elevator to get up to the projection floor, thankfully. It was quiet and dark up there, even if it did smell a little musty. Most of these old theaters had their own smell.

Guidry’s honestly wasn’t much like the tacky theater back in Lawrence that he and Jo used to haunt as kids during their summers, but being up here always made him think about its owner, Bobby Singer. The old coot used to take them up to the projector room in the early afternoons, between the matinee and evening showtimes, and teach them about the equipment. Sometimes he’d put on something just for them, selected from his dusty collection of old short films, Buster Keaton or Our Gang or Betty Boop. He’d died of a heart attack when Dean was twenty, but not before teaching Dean pretty much everything he could about taking care of the projector and reels. Dean had fallen in love with Hollywood during those afternoons.

Dean checked out the schedule for the night and smiled to himself. They only had three screens and they only showed classic cinema, but he’d been the one to convince Benny to expand the definition a little. He needed to get Vertigo and The Red Shoes ready, which were sensible choices, but their third screen was going to show Enter the Dragon. The early showing for each would start soon, and then Dean would have to rewind them and get them set back up for the later showing at nine.

Dean clicked the button on his walkie-talkie. “Hey Chambers,” he said, “how many seats have we pre-sold for Brucie Baby?”

There was a rustle of static before she replied, “Don’t get smug, Winchester, it’s not cute.”

“Benny disagrees.”

“Both of you get off the comms,” Benny’s muffled voice commanded. Then, after a beat of silence. “But, Winchester is pretty cute.”

“That’s workplace harassment,” Dean cackled, then did as he was told and put the radio down.

He whistled as he limped around getting the film reels out and getting them threaded and doing sound checks. All the reels looked like they were in pretty good shape, and the start times were staggered out by fifteen minutes so even with his slow pace it should work out. Once he’d gotten them all started, he could probably kick back and read a couple of chapters of The Fifth Season. Charlie had been promising him that it was gonna blow his mind.

He got the films going on time, listened to the murmurs of people settling down in their seats and the barks of laughter, watched the glowing lights of phone screens wavering like fireflies as people set them to mute or turned them off, and he felt… peaceful. Yeah, he’d wanted the flashier and more stressful job of acting, but this wasn’t bad, either. Just being around other people who loved movies, loving movies with them. And they’d never even see him up here, their Quasimodo in the bell tower. He just got to soak in the atmosphere and not worry if anyone was staring. He used to sneak girls up here to run lines with him and make out a little, but these days he just focused on doing his job.

The first showing went without a hitch, and his mind was a little blown by the book. Charlie never steered him wrong. Krissy came up for twenty minutes in between showings to help him set up for the second showing, and the easy banter had him laughing. Once the second showing had started, he propped his leg up and reached for his book again. He’d barely cracked it open before his phone buzzed in his pocket. He pulled it out to see that he had a message from Castiel.

Hi 👋 I wanted to say thx for yestrdeay 🌮🌮 😊😊 hope you good day

Initially, Dean was kind of surprised that Castiel was such a sloppy texter, and then remembered it was a Friday night and most people had better things to do with their Friday night than go to work and read a book.

Up to anything fun? Dean texted back, fully expecting to find out that Castiel was tipsy at a club, dancing with a stranger. He was surprised by the sudden, urgent, dark boil of jealousy inside him.

The response was a long buzz, and Dean realized Castiel was video-calling him. He quickly looked around to make sure things were good without him for a few minutes, then retreated to the dank little hallway outside the projection room to answer the call.

“Hey, man,” Dean said.

Castiel was stretched out on a sofa with his head resting on the arm of it, judging by what Dean could see. “Oh, there you are,” he said.

“What’s going on?”

“I just wanted to say hi,” Castiel answered, smiling beatifically. He was wearing a suit jacket and dress shirt, indicating that he’d just been at work, but the shirt was unbuttoned enough that a slice of golden, sweaty skin peeked through. Most notably, his pupils were twice their normal size.

“You’re tripping balls, aren’t you?”

“Not anymore. I’m coming down.”

“Where are you?”

“Ruby’s place. Anna and I have been working late all week, and Ruby said she had pizza and K for us.”

Dean wasn’t a complete stranger to ketamine, and had even taken it once, but he didn’t like it. He had felt great during the two hours it lasted, but in retrospect he didn’t like the heavy feeling or being so out of it. He preferred simpler pleasures.

“You having fun?”

Castiel sighed, and gave him a sad half-smile. “It’s not really about fun. It’s just hard to turn off the hypervigilance without some help. Me and Anna both. Working for our dads is just… stressful.”

“I worked for my dad for a while,” Dean said. “Before I moved to California.”

“So you know,” Castiel said, eyes looking up into the phone camera earnestly.

It wasn’t like Dean had ever fought with his father in such a way that John had physically grabbed him or punched him in a courthouse bathroom, but he felt like he did know, a little. All of John’s employees over the years had found him hard to please, but with Dean it sometimes felt like he couldn’t do anything right. There was always something he’d missed, something he could have done better. Could have done more like John.

“Yeah, I guess so,” Dean answered.

“If you want to do ketamine about it, you could come by,” Castiel said. “It’s only fair, since you gave me your weed.”

“Okay, well, I’m at work so I can’t come over and I can’t stay on the phone, either.”

“Ohhhh, sorry,” Castiel said. “Should I go?”

“Hang on,” Dean said, because it kind of worried him that Castiel basically hadn’t moved a muscle the whole time he’d been watching. He didn’t like the idea that Castiel couldn’t defend himself if someone wanted to mess with him. “Are you good? You know, safe?”

Castiel’s face went from surprise to a broad grin that showed all his teeth and even wrinkled his nose a little. It was so attractive that Dean couldn’t stand it, and he cursed himself viciously. This guy was not someone he could think about like that.

“Are you worried about me?”

“No,” Dean said shortly.

Castiel’s smile dropped. “Oh. Well, I’m fine. It’s just Anna and Ruby here, and they’re making out in the kitchen. They should really stop doing that in front of me.”

“Great,” Dean said. “I have to go.”

He hung up, and limped over to the storage room for their film reels so he could check the condition of the stock for their lineup for tomorrow night. He needed to do his job, not moon over the least-worst member of the family that ruined Dean’s life. He wasn’t going to feel guilty for snapping at him. Castiel’s weird sense of justice around sharing drugs notwithstanding, he needed to cut the guy off and make it clear that Castiel didn’t owe him anything.

Benny drove him home after work. He seemed to sense that Dean didn’t really want to talk, and turned the radio up to listen to some oldies-country station that reminded Dean of the music that was always playing in his dad’s shop. He viciously hit the button to switch stations and play something, anything else. Benny gave him a look from the corner of his eye, but didn’t say anything and just let Dean sulk.

Charlie hadn’t wanted Dean to spend all weekend holed up in their apartment by himself and had bugged him into making plans with Jody and Donna. Saturday brunch had sounded do-able when they’d planned it. But now it was Saturday morning and five minutes past the time he’d promised Jody and Donna that he’d be downstairs to get picked up, and he was sitting on his bed, pantsless and shoeless and halfway to crying. The shattered remains of the lamp from his bedside table formed a circle around him and pinned him in place, like he was a demon from a horror movie caught in some kind of esoteric trap. A narrow shaft of sunlight peeked through a slit in his blackout curtains and fell over his bare foot.

He’d fucked up.

His temper wasn’t like this before the accident, he was pretty sure. He could get hot under the collar and shout a few things he didn’t mean from time to time. He could be curt. But throwing a lamp against the wall was a new low. And now he was kind of stuck, because he would cut his feet if he tried to get up to find a pair of shoes or get the vacuum.

The hot prick of tears at the corners of his eyes had him sick with shame, cradling the back of his head with his hands and staring at his bare knees. Because he couldn’t get a damn pair of pants on, because he hadn’t done his stretches last night and he was so stiff that he couldn’t bend his back far enough to reach his feet, or lift his leg high enough to make up the difference.

He heard a muffled sound from the front of the apartment, and straightened up fast. It couldn’t possibly be Charlie, but he called out her name anyway because who else would be letting themselves into their apartment?

“Charlie?”

His mostly-closed bedroom pushed the rest of the way open, and a little more light spilled in. “It’s just me,” Donna said, poking her head in.

“I didn’t know you had a key.”

“It’s on loan for the weekend, just in case.”

Charlie was one thing, but Dean was ashamed for any of his other friends to see him like this. He started to drag a pillow over his lap, but Donna’s wide eyes were already looking, so he just stopped and stared at the floor at her feet.

“Oh wow, that’s a real improvement since I last saw it,” Donna said cheerfully, and crunched her way across the carpet to fling his curtains open. “That stuff they gave you to help with the scars is working a treat.”

Dean’s hands bunched and relaxed, bunched and relaxed, at his sides. Donna hadn’t seen his leg since he was in the hospital.

“If you say so,” he muttered.

“How come you’re not ready to go, hon?”

Dean gestured to the discarded puddle of black fabric at his feet. “Couldn’t get my damn pants on. Or at least not without hurting myself.”

Donna eyed the jeans, then turned to his closet and tossed him a pair of elastic-waisted joggers. “Wear those.”

Dean grimaced at them. “I don’t want to wear those to any restaurant with non-disposable forks on the table.”

Donna let out a peal of laughter just as Jody poked her own head into the room. She was always quick at assessing a given situation, and she just nodded.

“Gonna get the vacuum,” she said, and retreated.

“Just put the pants on, Dean-o,” Donna assured him. “No one is going to care.”

Dean knew that once these two were on his case, he didn’t have much of a chance of arguing, so he didn’t. He just worked the pants over his feet, breathing slow and careful and deep through the ache in his hip, then hauled himself up on the grab bar to tug them over his ass. Donna was right there with socks in one hand and his nicest pair of sneakers in the other. Jody was already at work cleaning up the broken lamp.

Dean fought back tears again. Jody and Donna weren’t used to this like Charlie was, but they were taking it pretty well in stride, including seeing him in his underwear. He got his socks and shoes on while Jody and Donna made sure his carpet was clear.

They finally got to the restaurant almost twenty minutes after their reservation time, and the hostess was a real shithead about it, too. But when Dean looked up from the floor to show off his face and start his limping shuffle over to their table, she suddenly traded her clipped words for an obsequious tone. It pissed him off but he’d already had an outburst this morning, so he tried not to throw a pitcher of iced cucumber-mint water at her.

Once they’d settled down and ordered their meal, Donna turned her sunshine smile on Dean again.

“It’s just nice to see you out and about again,” she said. “I’m glad you agreed to join us.”

“Yeah, well, I wanted to catch up on the gossip,” Dean said. “You guys always have wild stories for me.”

“No way, first you gotta tell us how you’re doing, bud,” Jody countered. “You haven’t exactly been texting back much.”

Dean looked down into his coffee. “Yeah. Sorry.”

Jody’s hand fell over his, and he looked up to see her giving him a sad smile. “It’s okay. Charlie keeps us up to date, mostly. But we miss you.”

“Miss you guys, too,” Dean said, voice thick in his throat. “Just been… taking up pretty much everything I got to drag myself to work and the doctor and court.”

“Well, look at you now,” Donna said, gesturing with her mimosa. “Brunching at the beach again. Before you know it, you’ll be back in front of the cameras.”

Dean lifted his head to stare at her, and didn’t miss that Jody was also giving Donna a sharp cut-it-out look. “Yeah, maybe I can get a bit part in a Pirates of the Caribbean knockoff,” he said.

The words sort of flopped into the middle of their table like a dead animal and left them all staring in silence until it was broken by the delivery of their food. They managed to rally to exclaim about how good it all was—artisanal sourdough, poached eggs, smoked salmon, fresh avocado, roasted peppers, tropical fruit salad—and got a good few minutes out of poking fun at themselves for eating avocado toast.

Dean took a couple of pictures for his Instagram. Being an actor put a certain amount of pressure on him to maintain a social media presence, but he hadn’t had much interesting content to share over the past few months. The accident had been in the news; his followers knew he was recovering and were cheering him on to go back to work—but he hadn’t shown any photos of his face yet. He didn’t do it now, either, just taking shots of the table and the view of the beach.

After that, they stuck to talking about what Jody and Donna were up to at work. Dean’s eyes drifted away from the table to look around the restaurant. A couple of people were staring at his scarred face, but he ignored it because he wouldn’t give anybody the satisfaction.

“Anybody want to take a little walk on the beach before we head out?” Jody asked, pressing a hand to her stomach. “I could stand to work a little of the food off.”

Dean looked down at his crutches.

“We’ll stick to the paved path,” Jody assured him.

“Yeah, all right, for a few minutes,” Dean said, because he was actually supposed to be trying to walk short distances now.

They walked in comfortable silence for a few minutes, and Dean tried not to be thinking about anything. He wanted to enjoy the ocean breeze and kids screaming and the company of his friends. But the more he looked out over the water, the less enjoyable it felt.

He hadn’t been out here in a long time. Not since a few weeks before the accident. He used to be down here practically daily, to go for a jog or go surfing, to flirt with anyone who glanced his way. Not anymore.

“Hey, Dean, weren’t you in a movie about surfing, once?”

“Yeah,” he said, watching his feet. “The Big One. One of my first roles when I moved out here. I was just a background character, I only had a few lines, but I learned how to surf for it.”

“Bet that made you feel like a real Californian,” Donna said in her thick, Minnesota accent, and laughed.

“Yeah,” Dean said, feeling close to tears. He swallowed the lump in his throat as he watched a couple of teenagers boogie boarding in the shallow waves. “Guess it did.”

Jody and Donna seemed to sense it was the wrong topic, and turned it toward a crazy story about their neighbor and some stolen laundry as they herded him back toward the car and drove him home.

As they were dropping him off, Jody said, “Dean, I got bad news. I got pulled to work overtime for some re-shoots on Monday, so I can’t take you to your therapy appointment.”

Donna was looking away across the parking lot with a guilty expression, which meant less that she was busy and more that she couldn’t bear the thought of getting behind a wheel again. She hadn’t since the accident—even though she hadn’t been the one driving that night, she got panic attacks when she tried to drive now. She was working on it.

“Hey, it’s okay,” Dean said, giving them both a squeeze on the shoulder from his place in the back seat. “You guys always help out when you can, I appreciate it. I’ll ask if Benny can do it, okay? There’s always Uber, too. Can’t wait until I feel up to just grabbing the Metro again.”

“All right, well, we gotta run if we don’t want to be late for Wendy’s karate tournament, but don’t be a stranger,” Donna said, turning to give him a one-armed hug.

“Yeah, you got working fingers and a cell phone,” Jody added, twisting in her seat and giving his back a gentle thump at the end of her own hug.

“Yeah, yeah, get out of here,” Dean said. “And, uh… thank you.”

They waved at him over their shoulders as they pulled away and went off to go be interesting, functional people somewhere else. Dean went upstairs to his apartment to take a small dose of Oxy and settle in to watch The Simpsons for the rest of the afternoon. He had work later, and wanted to be rested before Benny came to pick him up.

As they drove down to Guidry’s, he found out that Benny couldn’t take him to therapy on Monday, either. So he’d have to shell out for Uber and try not to have a heart attack about the state of his finances.

… unless he wanted to do something really stupid.

Chapter Text

Ketch called on Monday morning.

“I have fantastic news,” he said, and in spite of himself Dean felt a spark of hope.

“Yeah?”

“I got you a role.”

“Oh my god, really?”

“Check your email and call me back in ten minutes.” The phone made the booping noise that signalled the abrupt end that calls with Ketch always had.

Dean couldn’t even be pissed about Ketch hanging up on him, for once. He was already eagerly thumbing open his mail app and swiping to refresh his inbox over and over again until the email arrived. He didn’t read whatever self-aggrandizing bullshit Ketch wrote in the body of the email, going straight for the attachment with laser focus.

He read the side sheet three times and felt his heart sinking and his guts clenching because he’d known, hadn’t he? He’d known that his career was dead in the water.

Still, when his return call to Ketch connected, the first thing he said was, “Very funny, Ketch. I can’t believe you’re interrupting my day for a joke. Call me again when you have a real offer.”

Ketch’s chuckle was as oily as the rest of him. “Winchester, you and I both know that this is not a joke. This is a legitimate job offer, and one I’m advising you to take. Any role is better than no role, as you well know.”

“It’s a single line!” Dean protested, despising how weak his voice came out. “For a fucking mafia goon! That’s not even my brand!”

“Screentime is screentime, and you know better than to think you can still land the same roles that you could before your face was mangled. Look, I’m a busy man and I have other clients. Let me know if you’re taking the audition by the end of the day, please. Goodbye.”

Dean hung up on Ketch first, this time. He let out a frustrated yell and threw his phone onto the couch. He’d never gotten along well with Ketch, but the agency had assigned them to each other and up until now, Dean’s career had been interesting enough to both of them that they had been able to brush their interpersonal issues aside.

Dean turned back to the lunch preparations he’d been in the middle of. He was trying to eat well and not put on weight while he wasn’t able to exercise, and the hospital had set him up with a nutritionist because apparently being an actor was in itself a warning sign that he might be prone to eating disorders that would stunt the healing process. He didn’t think he would ever have that problem, considering his relationship with bacon, but he wasn’t going to say no to a free session with a nutritionist or the book full of printed-out recipes he’d been given.

He looked at the chicken breast, the apple, and almonds that were still waiting to be prepped to go on his salad. None of it looked that good anymore. He could practically hear his mother’s typical rant about wasted food and starving kids in Africa in the back of his head, though, so he finished making his salad and ate it mechanically while looking over the part Ketch had sent him again. Because Ketch was right, whether Dean liked it or not. He should be taking anything that came his way, regardless of whether it was a downgrade from his previous roles. If he wanted to stay here, he needed money.

And he really wanted to stay here.

Maybe his folks were right that God was real. If so, the Man Upstairs had a real sense of humor. Or maybe it was just fate, or Dean receiving back the energy he was putting into the universe. Whatever the reason, he’d barely shoveled the last bite of his lunch into his mouth before his phone buzzed. He looked down to see a message from his dad pop up on the screen.

Baby’s been all fixed up for weeks and taking up space I don’t have in the garage. Let your mother know when you’ll be coming to get this rust bucket.

Dean felt bile and fury instantly rise up his throat. He painstakingly typed out with shaking fingers, Thought you were bringing her to me.

Don’t have the time. Call your mother.

Dean threw the phone down again and pressed a shaking hand over his eyes. His other hand clenched and released, clenched and released on his thigh. He didn’t want to lose his temper again and wreck any of Charlie’s stuff. He wasn’t that kind of asshole. He wouldn’t let himself be.

A few minutes later, his phone buzzed again to alert him that his mom was calling. He groaned as he picked it up.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Hi, baby,” she said warmly, as if this call was totally random. “I just wanted to check if you’re coming for Thanksgiving this year. It’s only about 6 weeks away; it’s not too early to start planning.”

“Mom,” Dean said carefully, hand still over his eyes, “I don’t really know how I’d get there.”

“You can fly this one time, can’t you? Then you can drive the car back.”

“I can’t,” Dean said. Even the mention of flying sent his heart crashing against his ribs like a war drum. He knew it was a stupid phobia to have, but knowing it was stupid didn’t just magically solve it. “Dad was supposed to bring the car to me and then he would fly home. That was the plan.”

“I know, baby, but you know how it is. It’s hard to take the time away, and your dad really didn’t like driving in California. And honestly, I wasn’t that impressed with L.A. either. It’s dirty, Dean, and it’s so crowded, and there’s so much drug abuse and homelessness—”

“I’m not going to have another fight with you about homelessness, or L.A. in general,” Dean said. “Come on, Mom.”

“Besides,” she went on as if she hadn’t heard him, “we’d really like to have you out here for a while. You know how much Thanksgiving and Christmas mean to me.”

“I know, Mom; I’d really like to come. But I just don’t know how to get there if Dad isn’t going to drive the car back to me.”

“He’d like to, Dean, he really would. But you know how hard it is for him to close the shop for that long, and he already closed up for a week when you were in the hospital.”

“He promised,” Dean said, and heard his voice waver. He scrubbed hard at his eyes. He wasn’t crying. He fucking wasn’t.

He heard John’s voice echoing somewhere deep in the center of him. Telling Mary their boy was too sensitive, that John was worried about him. Heard Mary arguing that it was a damn musical at school and Dean was only ten and it was nothing worth worrying about. Their hollering had carried up the stairs and made Sam tremble. Mary had told John she was going to leave his ass this time if he wasn’t careful.

Dean had been too young to understand what ‘sensitive’ was a euphemism for.

“Look, Mom, I have to go, but I’ll talk to you soon if I figure something out, okay?” he said quickly. “Love you.” He hung up on her before she could say anything.

His mom’s way of making him feel like shit was more subtle than John’s, but it lingered longer, staying with him while he took a shower and got ready for therapy. He felt like a shambling pile of garbage as he made his way downstairs to meet his Uber ride. The double-take when they saw his scarred face in the rearview mirror really, really didn’t help.

Dean had brought his book along so he’d have something to do while he waited to be picked up after therapy, but he was too exhausted and pissed off to even get it from his bag. Sam had texted him, probably because their mother had told him that Dean was being stubborn and had asked Sam to try a different angle. Dean wasn’t feeling up to looking at Sam’s message, so he let his phone go dark in his lap, sitting silently with his head tilted back against the wall and his eyes closed.

He heard the sound of the sliding doors whoosh open, and Dean opened his eyes to see Castiel come striding in, looking polished and posh and deeply uncomfortable. Shirt properly buttoned all the way up, tie in a perfect knot, shoes gleaming, face fixed into place in a distant, unamused expression. He looked more like an actor playing a lawyer  than an actual lawyer.

“Hey,” Dean said. “You could have just texted me to come out.”

Castiel tilted his head with uncertainty, then shrugged. “Are you ready to go?”

“Yeah, get me the fuck away from these sadists,” Dean said, shooting a wink at the receptionist, who just rolled her eyes at him. “Give me a hand?”

Castiel immediately reached out a hand to help him stand up and get his crutches situated under him.

“Thanks. And thanks for the ride, too.”

“Of course,” Castiel said easily, like it was no big deal for a lawyer in a famous, high-profile firm to just leave work at five on the dot and come over to Santa Monica during rush hour, especially when Dean knew for a fact he worked crazy hours. (Not that anybody in the movie business had normal shifts, either, but still.)

It was obvious that Castiel was trying to carry his cousin’s guilt for him. Dean honestly felt kind of bad about taking advantage of it.

Castiel was matching Dean’s shuffling pace, but his hand tapped impatiently and repetitively at his leg. As soon as they were clear of the doors, he reached into his pocket and retrieved a pack of cigarettes and placed one into his mouth. Dean shook his head when Castiel held the pack out to him with raised eyebrows. Castiel lit up, took a long drag, and let it out slowly. The nervous tapping slowed to a stop.

“Anything interesting happen to you today?” Castiel asked.

Dean didn’t mean to, but he laughed. It was a dark, ugly sound.

“Yeah, same here,” Castiel said. “You want to talk about it?”

“Not really,” Dean said.

“Fair enough. Anything you do want?” Castiel asked, opening the passenger side door of a silver Beamer and gesturing for Dean to get in, hand already held out in case Dean needed the extra help.

Dean let out a soft whistle when he saw the cushy, fawn-colored leather interior. “Wow, nice.” Therapy was tough, as usual, and he was so physically exhausted that he had to lift his leg into the car with his hands. “I want a lot of things, but I’ll settle for smoking a bowl at home with some In-N-Out. Would you mind hitting the drive-through on the way back to my place?”

“No, of course not,” Castiel said, and swung the car out into traffic.

Dean didn’t have any kind of phobia about being in a car in the wake of the accident, but he might develop one after getting in a car with this maniac. Castiel was zipping in and out of traffic like he was in a video game, chain-smoking his way through three cigarettes while Dean gripped the door handle and closed his eyes. He’d been driving here for a couple of years and was mostly used to it, but Castiel was showing him what it really meant to be an L.A. native.

Castiel ordered food for himself at the drive-through, too, and paid for both of them, blithely ignoring Dean’s glare. When he pulled his car into Dean’s unused parking space at the apartment complex, Dean thought about the evening that stretched out in front of him. Charlie wasn’t home until tomorrow and Dean didn’t have a shift tonight. The idea of being alone wasn’t appealing right now. He could already tell he was cruising for a spiral of self-loathing.

Dean really shouldn’t do this, but he was going to do it anyway.

“You want to bring that up and hang with me?” Dean asked, gesturing at Castiel’s bag of food.

Castiel hesitated.

“You’d be doing me a favor,” Dean said. “I don’t really want to be alone right now. I got all the beer and weed you could possibly want.”

“That sounds… really good,” Castiel said, flicking his eyes away. “But I’ll have to drive home at some point, so I can’t.”

“You can crash here if you need to,” Dean shrugged.

Now Castiel turned to look at him, long and serious the way he had a few times before. “If you’re sure.”

Dean knew he was about to start blushing, so he opened the car door and started arranging his crutches to haul himself up. “Look man, it’s not a big deal, do whatever you want.”

“Okay,” Castiel said, turning the car off. “Yeah, sure.”

Dean led him over to the elevator, then stopped and stared at the OUT OF ORDER sign taped over the call button.

“Damn it!” he said. “That’s the third fucking time this month. I know that little fucker is doing this just to screw with me.”

Castiel perked up like a dog who’d just heard a whistle. “Who is?”

“The building super! He kept hitting on my roommate back when we first moved in. He found out she’s a lesbian and, instead of giving up, he got real gross about it. I had to get in his face to make it stop. He never really got over it; he’s always ‘losing’ our maintenance tickets. My dad had to install the grab bars in the bathroom and bedroom for me. And that shithead knows damn well that I can’t use the stairs right now, and suddenly, the elevator is going out all the time when it’s worked perfectly the whole time I’ve lived here, up until now.”

Castiel’s face was turning more and more thunderous as Dean explained, but Dean had been dealing with the situation for long enough that he could barely even get angry about it, anymore. It didn’t do any good. He shuffled over to the staircase and looked up with trepidation, feeling his leg throbbing and his hip aching. He could do this, but it was going to take ages and leave him hurting. Plus the food was going to get cold.

He didn’t even notice the lump in his throat until his eyes spilled over and he realized he was crying.

You know what I’m talking about, Mary! He’s so… sensitive.

“Ah, hell,” he muttered, wiping at his tears with the sleeve of his hoodie. “Sorry, shit, it’s just been a really bad day.”

“Dean,” Castiel said, “hold still.”

Dean, so lost in his own misery, didn’t see Castiel coming when he suddenly swept Dean up into his arms, one arm under Dean’s knees and the other braced across his back. Dean yelped in surprise as his feet left the ground, accidentally smacking Castiel hard in the shin with one of his crutches. Castiel grimaced a little, but his grip on Dean didn’t waver.

“I’ll come back for the food in a moment,” he said, and started climbing the stairs.

Holy hell. Castiel was carrying him. In his arms. Right up against his chest. Like it was no big deal to be able to carry a whole, entire, adult man up a staircase. Dean had actual goddamn butterflies in his stomach.

What are we doing to do with a kid like that? He’s gonna get eaten alive out in the real world. They’re gonna think he’s weak.

“Oh my fucking god,” Dean said, heart racing and stomach twisting. “You can’t just carry me all the way to the third floor.”

“Obviously I can,” Castiel grunted. “And then I’m going to draft a discrimination complaint letter to send to your building’s management.”

“What?” Dean squawked. He flailed a little, and Castiel’s grip slipped. Dean had a sudden, terrifying vision of Castiel dropping him, of bouncing down the stairs, of dislocating his hip and shattering his leg into a million pieces again. He froze. He would have thrown his arms around Castiel’s neck if they weren’t still gripping his crutches. “Wh-What are you talking about?”

“You and your roommate are being discriminated against in a way that is legally actionable,” Castiel said, huffing for air as he started up the second flight of stairs. “Your super can’t get away with that.”

“Since when are you my lawyer? I don’t remember hiring you.”

Castiel stopped on the stairs and stared at Dean for a moment. “You’re right,” he said, softer and less wrathful. “I can’t represent you without my father hearing about it. I’ll call Crowley and ask him to send it through his practice.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Dean sputtered as Castiel started moving again. “Dude, you can’t just start threatening to sue people any time they’re being a jerk off.”

“He’s not merely being a jerk off,” Castiel said insistently.

“What’s that saying? If all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail?”

“And?”

“You’re the hammer in this scenario, bud,” Dean said. They’d arrived at his floor, so Dean writhed in Castiel’s arms until Castiel put him down. “I don’t want to make things worse for Charlie, so I don’t want to send a letter or whatever. I can handle my own shit. Capisce?”

Castiel looked furious and whirled around to head right back down the stairs.

“Are you seriously leaving because I don’t need your self-righteous lawyer shit?” Dean snapped.

“I’m getting the fucking hamburgers, Dean,” Castiel said just before his head disappeared around the turn.

Dean felt like there were thorns wrapped around inside his chest, and maybe poking out of his skin. He was always like this. He’d gotten defensive and lost his temper on someone who had gone out of his way to help. He was a prickly, awful bastard.

He was still standing there like an idiot when Castiel marched back up the stairs with a poker face on.

“I should get going,” Castiel said.

“No,” Dean said, ducking his head. Sensitive. “Just… just come in, okay? I didn’t mean it like that.”

Castiel gave him a long look before nodding and mounting the last step onto the third floor and following Dean to his apartment door.

“Home sweet home,” Dean croaked, gesturing Castiel inside.

It was pretty clean inside, no thanks to Charlie. Dean was the one who liked things to be tidy. All the little knick-knacks on the bookshelf—the baby Yoda figurine, the giant 20-sided die, the Hermione bobble head doll, all the rest—had just been dusted this morning, and Dean had cleaned the kitchen up thoroughly after his lunch. The books themselves were organized not by author or category, but by color to make rainbow stripes, which drove all their friends crazy. A Zelda triforce shield hung on the wall next to a pride flag, and there were Lord of the Rings themed dish towels hanging in the kitchen. Dean hadn’t picked most of it, but neither did he mind being surrounded by all this geekdom. Dish towels were dish towels and these ones made Charlie happy.

Castiel took it all in with a faint smile.

“Charlie’s a big ol’ nerd,” Dean explained, though it probably wasn’t necessary.

“Your home is very unapologetically yours,” Castiel said, walking over to their cramped little kitchen table and setting the food down. “I like it.”

“I gotta sit the fuck down,” Dean said, limping over and shoving aside his huge pile of insurance paperwork. “Can you grab us a couple of beers from the fridge? We also have iced tea and La Croix if you’d prefer.”

Castiel started to comply, but got mesmerized by all the stuff they’d plastered to the refrigerator. The exposed side had neat orderly rows of spices in little magnetized containers, while the front was covered in magnets, postcards and photos. Dean’s favorite was the candid he’d gotten of Jody and Donna kissing on New Year’s earlier this year.

“Ignore Charlie’s absolutely filthy mind,” he called out as he unpacked their food onto the table. “Getting her a magnet poetry set for Christmas was a really bad idea.”

Castiel scanned through the mess until he found the dirty poem Dean was talking about, and his laughter was bright with surprise. He finally opened the fridge and got their drinks, then came over to the table to eat. He finally shed his jacket and loosened his tie a bit, too.

“Do you want to talk about your day yet?” Castiel asked politely.

“Hell, no. Are you even allowed to talk about your day? I don’t know what lawyers are allowed to talk about.”

“Hmmm. I can tell you about the woman who brought not one, not two, but three Jack Russel terriers with her to have a meeting with Zachariah Adler the other day.”

“No way,” Dean said, delighted that he was getting a brand new kind of gossip that wasn’t from a film set. He chomped on a french fry, grinning. “Aren’t terriers kinda hyperactive?”

“If by hyperactive you mean one of them spent the whole meeting humping Zachariah’s leg, then sure,” Castiel said, grinning back. “The two that got out of his office were the real problem.”

Castiel kept Dean entertained with stories like that while they ate, and Dean ignored the fact that Castiel was polishing off his third beer by the time they finished their meal. Dean wasn’t exactly a poster child for clean living, either. He was mostly thinking about the fact that in Castiel’s stories, he was the one cleaning up other people’s messes, taking the blame when something went wrong, and pulling all-nighters to get things submitted to the court on time. And here Dean had been thinking that Castiel’s need to pay for things on Dean’s behalf and do favors for him was coming from the fact that they’d had sex before Gabe had ruined Dean’s life. Apparently, Dean wasn’t even special; Castiel took responsibility for all the family messes, all the time.

“Come on,” Dean said, getting to his feet with a grunt. “I promised you weed.”

Castiel grabbed a fourth beer before following Dean into his bedroom, which he kept just as tidy as the common areas. Since his accident, he couldn’t really have things on the floor anyway.

“Fire escape,” Dean said, pointing to his window as he dug in his top drawer for the box where he kept medication. He’d stopped taking blood thinners by now but still had half a bottle rattling around in there with stool softeners and anti-nausea shit, all the stuff he’d needed after surgery. He had some Oxy for bad pain days, Tylenol and weed for better days. He dry-swallowed some Tylenol before he brought his pipe over to the window. Castiel had already climbed out to sit on the stairs of the fire escape, drinking his beer and watching the sunset. He wasn’t looking at Dean, so Dean felt safe to look up at him.

God, he was pretty. Even prettier like this, glowing amber and gold with a streaky halo of pink clouds behind his head.

Dean reminded himself that this guy was a fuck up from a whole family of fuck ups. That his cousin was in jail for how close he’d come to killing Dean. That he hadn’t even wanted to give Dean his number that night. The only reason he was here now was because he was carrying a massive guilt complex.

Dean parked his ass on the window sill, one arm dangling out. He lit the pipe, took a couple of puffs, and passed it over. Castiel did the same, then turned a soft smile to Dean.

“Do you want to come out here?”

“I am not really in climbing-through-windows shape right now.”

“I can help.”

“Are you offering to pick me up again?”

“Yes.”

God help him, Dean actually thought about it before shaking his head. “I’m good.”

They didn’t talk for a couple of minutes. Dean’s apartment complex wasn’t close enough to the ocean to hear the waves over the sounds of traffic, but they could listen to the gulls calling and the air was thick with the smell.

“This is really nice,” Castiel said.

“Sitting on my fire escape?”

“It’s very relaxing,” Castiel said.

Dean snorted. “You were relaxing just fine on Friday.”

Castiel didn’t seem embarrassed that Dean had brought it up, smiling faintly as he scrubbed a rough hand through his already-messy hair. “I needed that.”

“Seemed like you had a tough week,” Dean said, cautiously trying to ask if Castiel was okay without actually asking.

“It’s every week,” Castiel said, picking up the pipe for another hit. “I walk on eggshells all day, every day, and I’m… fucking exhausted. I can’t even relax at home, because I never know when he’s going to show up to drop last-minute work on me, or just to ream me out for some imagined disrespect or imagined error. I wind up making mistakes because I’m so fucking wound up about what’ll happen if I make a mistake. The only reason I’m surviving is because Bowser’s been getting me Adderall to help me focus when I get too jumpy. God, I miss law school. Best years of my life.”

Dean didn’t really know what to say. The way Castiel said ‘he’ might show up… Dean was beginning to suspect that maybe that situation in the courthouse bathroom was not a heat-of-the-moment, one-time deal.

“Sorry for dumping on you like that,” Castiel said after a long silence. His voice had gone soft and blurred around the edges. “You’re easy to talk to.”

“That’s cool,” Dean said. His own mind was slowing down, and the bite of worry was dulling a bit. “I like talking to you, too.”

“Can I ask you something?” Castiel asked.

“Yeah, sure.”

Castiel was quiet for a moment. He was rubbing repetitively at his forearm through his shirt, forehead furrowed. Dean watched the darkening sunset paint shadows along the bridge of Castiel’s nose and under his jaw. Dean spread his hands on his own thighs to stop himself from reaching out to trace the edges of those shadows.

“Did you mean it? About me being a hammer?”

It hit like a gut punch. Castiel wasn’t even looking at him, just rubbing at his own arm and holding his lips pursed like he was waiting for an answer he wouldn’t like. Dean’s mind was telling him that he barely knew the guy, that it was a mistake to keep inviting this closeness. But his heart ached, and he realized that one of the things he didn’t know about Castiel was whether there was anyone in his life who’d ever said a single kind word to him.

“No,” Dean said. He reached out and nudged Castiel’s knee. “I have a short temper and I say bullshit I don’t mean when I’m upset. And I’m not… I’m still getting used to all of this. I was in really good shape, before. Not being able to use the stairs is kind of…”

“You were embarrassed.”

“Yeah, man. I was.”

“I’m sorry I made you feel that way.”

“It wasn’t you,” Dean said. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

That made Castiel furrow up his forehead even more, but he didn’t say anything.

“Did you hurt your arm?” Dean asked.

“What?”

“You keep…” Dean trailed off, gesturing at where Castiel’s thumb still stroked repetitively near his elbow.

“Oh, no, it’s just, uh…” Castiel didn’t finish his sentence either, but he did unbutton the cuff of his shirt and roll it up. Dean tried to brace himself for track marks or something, but it was just a tattoo. Just simple black ink against Cas’s golden skin, only a couple of inches tall. It seemed to be a snake wrapped around some kind of pole or stick.

“I feel like I should know what that is,” Dean said.

“It’s the Rod of Asclepius, universal symbol of emergency medical responders.”

“That’s cool. Why’d you get that?”

Castiel rolled his sleeve back down. “Maybe I’ll tell you someday.”

Dean was almost taken aback to have Castiel suddenly clam up about something, but it was fair enough that he didn’t want to spill his entire life story while they could still count the number of conversations they’d had on one hand.

“If you ever want to, sure,” Dean said. “For now, why don’t you come inside and watch a movie with me or something?”

Castiel perked up and the frown smoothed out a little. “That sounds good. I feel like watching a movie with someone who works at a classic theater will be interesting.”

Dean barely restrained himself from preening. “I mean, I can probably broaden your horizons. A lot of what we show is the kind of stuff everybody knows, but we throw in a few rare gems.”

Castiel shrugged. “I hardly ever watch movies; I rarely have the time. Mostly just whatever pops up on the homepage of Amazon when I need some background noise.”

“But you’ve seen like, Psycho and Casablanca and My Fair Lady and the popular ones at least, right?”

“I don’t think so. I’ve seen La La Land.”

“Dear god,” Dean said, clutching theatrically at his chest. “You live in Hollywood! How?”

“Excuse me, I live in Highland Park,” Castiel said, sounding genuinely offended.

“That’s how it feels,” Dean said, pointing at him, “when someone compares Casablanca to La La Land.”

“So, we’re watching Casablanca?” Castiel asked as he finally climbed back in through the window.

“Fuck no,” Dean said. “High on a Monday night after burgers? It’s gotta be Mel Brooks.”

“Who’s Mel Brooks?”

“Oh my god. Please tell me you’re fucking with me.”

“Afraid not.”

“Get in here and sit down so I can fix this travesty.”

A few hours later, Dean curled up in bed and stared out through his open bedroom window at the abandoned beer bottle left on the fire escape. Castiel had giggled his way through Blazing Saddles, ate way more than his fair share of the microwave popcorn, used their last spare toothbrush, and zonked out to sleep on the sofa in his undershirt and boxer shorts. Castiel Shurley. Golden son-slash-whipping boy, chronic substance abuser, and maybe one of the sweetest guys Dean had ever met. Right there in the living room.

Charlie was going to flip.

Dean probably should have given Charlie more credit, because she was surprisingly cool with it when Dean told her about it, although she did ask if Dean was having an “I can fix him” moment. Which… okay, maybe he was, but Dean brushed that part off. A little over a week later, she got to meet Castiel for herself.

Castiel texted around seven o’clock on Thursday evening. Whether he knew in advance that it was one of Dean’s days off from Guidry’s or was just a lucky guess, Dean didn’t know.

🍕🍻🌿@your place????

Dean and Charlie were both in their respective rooms doing their own thing. Dean was too lazy to get up, and they had a rule about not yelling across the apartment so that they wouldn’t be crappy neighbors. So, he texted her: Castiel is coming over to get baked apparently. You in?

Tell me again about how he isn’t your little project 🙄🙄🙄, she replied.

Shut the hell your mouth, Bradbury.

It’s literally shut, Winchester. 🤐

Dean just gave a thumbs-up to Castiel’s message and went back to looking at some scripts that Ketch had sent him. They were all bit parts, and only two of them even had speaking lines. He ended up throwing his laptop across the bed, just narrowly stopping himself from throwing it straight out of a window. He had been getting tons of scripts, good scripts, before the accident. And he knew, without Ketch having to spell it out for him, that guys like him were a dime a dozen and nobody was going to take a damaged actor when there were plenty of other hopefuls clamoring for the same roles. This was bullshit. Whatever the court had ruled, Gabe Milton fucking owed him for this.

Castiel turned up near eight p.m. with three boxes of pizza stacked in his arms and two six-packs of beer dangling in shopping bags looped over his wrists.

“Thanks for letting me come back,” he said as soon as Dean opened the door for him.

“Yeah, well. I fed the stray, it’s my problem now, or something.”

Castiel laughed as he moved past Dean to set everything down on their kitchen table and then over to the window to light up a cigarette. He must have come straight from work; he was all buttoned up in a beautifully-tailored dark gray suit and blue tie that made him look serious and unapproachable. But to Dean’s eyes, the suit was too loose, Castiel’s skin too sallow, and he could have carried a load of groceries in the bags under his eyes. It was surprising how quickly he was starting to look like shit. He’d been a different person a few months ago.

It wasn’t like Dean had never seen this kind of thing, with the circles he used to run in, but with Castiel it felt different. He was a friend, smoking at their window in his socks and rolled-up sleeves, not some recently-discovered musician crashing and burning at a party.

He turned and watched Dean with observant eyes.

“Your physical therapy seems to be going well.”

“Sort of,” Dean said. He was supposed to try going without crutches around the apartment and for short distances, and it had perversely made his sciatica worse. He was taking more pain medication now than he had been a few weeks ago. “Shouldn’t be limping this much, but my stupid foot’s always numb or giving me pins and needles or something. They said it probably isn’t permanent, but who the fuck knows?”

He grabbed a slice of pizza and took a bite to shut himself up.

Charlie had emerged from her room and came up behind him to poke him in the side. “That’s quitter’s talk, Winchester, and we don’t allow quitter’s talk in this house.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he grumbled with his mouth full of pizza. Barbecue chicken pizza with red onions and jalapeños, in fact, which was fucking heavenly. He moaned to show his appreciation.

“It’s good, right?” Castiel smiled, but he had started doing that nervous tapping thing he always did.

“Get a plate, you slob,” Charlie said, poking Dean again.

“I’m taking this one to go,” Dean said. “Come on, let’s go smoke. Whet our appetites.”

He figured Castiel wouldn’t be able to chill until he got some medicinal assistance with it. No need to make him suffer through polite dinner conversation first.

“Marvelous idea,” Charlie said. She grabbed a slice, and walked over to the living room window to climb out onto the fire escape. She went up a few steps to make room for them, and Dean lost sight of her in the dark. Castiel put out his cigarette, and came over to grab a beer before following her.

Dean approached the window and considered whether he was feeling up to getting his ass through the window. Physically he could do it now, but with the nerve pain he wasn’t sure he wanted to.

A hand reached through the window.

“Come on,” Castiel said. “I’ll help you.”

Dean let himself be guided out, not missing the way Charlie was watching Castiel’s hands on Dean. She didn’t say anything, just ate her pizza. Castiel didn’t let him go until he was safely sitting two steps below Charlie’s seat, leaning his back against her legs. Castiel plunked down cross-legged on the landing. His hands were steady as he rolled a joint by the light coming through the window, but Dean could practically feel the nervous tension wafting off him along with the ever-present faint smell of cigarettes.

“You doing okay?” he asked, giving Castiel an easy nudge with his sock-clad left foot.

Castiel took a long drag and handed the joint over before answering. “Yeah. Now I’m good.”

“Bad day?”

“Not exactly,” Castiel replied as he popped the lid off his beer and took a drink. “But it would be if I went home.” He didn’t look up, and Dean realized he didn’t want to say more in front of Charlie.

“Well, I guess you’d better stay here then,” Dean said casually, taking a hit and passing the joint off to Charlie.

“For how long?” Castiel asked, so quietly that Dean knew he wasn’t supposed to have heard it.

Dean tipped his head back against Charlie’s knees, let her start petting his hair as he took the joint back, took another hit, and passed it back to Castiel. He closed his eyes so neither of the other two would know that he was on the verge of tears. He had so much shit going on already. He could barely keep his own head above water, and he just didn’t know if he had it in him to keep Castiel from drowning, too.

They didn’t see Castiel again for a while. There were a few texts here and there, memes and casual conversation. But when Dean got a night off from Guidry’s and would send a 🍔 + 🌿 + 📺 ? text, he would usually fall asleep and miss Castiel’s reply, which was always past midnight and said something like sorry was at work 🤬 or sorry was 🫠🫠🫠 maybe tmrw 🙏. But then he’d never follow up.

So Dean stopped texting. If the guy wanted to be elsewhere, doing harder drugs with friends he preferred over Dean, that was his choice. Dean did his shifts at Guidry’s, training Krissy and pretend-flirting with his boss, and he called Jody and Donna to come over for board games. He wrote Castiel Shurley off as a weird chapter in his life that seemed to have come to an end.

Dean decided to bite the bullet and take the shitty role as a mafia goon. He’d graduated to walking a little bit without crutches just in time. The director was actually thrilled to have him, telling him that his limp and scar added “vitality” and “gravitas” to his role. Dean thought it was a load of bullshit. His whole job was to pick up a plain manila envelope, say the words “I’ll let her know right away, sir,” and walk off.

But hey, it was a paycheck, and the director said she was going to keep him in mind for a potentially larger role in the potential sequel. Ketch made a horrifying noise when Dean called to tell him the good news, like he was nutting right there on the phone.

He’d told Benny about the job in case it made him late for work at Guidry’s that night. He hadn’t expected Benny to get pastelitos from Gigi’s so the crew could celebrate Dean’s first gig since his accident. He punched Benny on the arm and scolded him for making it into a big deal, but he couldn’t give him much of a hard time since he had to rescue a couple of pastelitos before Krissy and Josephine could eat them all.

He got surprised again when he got home to find Charlie waiting up for him, wearing her unicorn kigurumi with the hood thrown back so she could wear a party hat. There were champagne and strawberries on the coffee table.

“Geez, strawberries?” Dean laughed as he came in. He leaned his crutches on the wall by the door. He wasn’t using them inside the apartment anymore, and liked to leave them where he could grab them on his way out the door. “You trying to seduce me, Bradbury?”

“You should be so lucky, Winchester,” Charlie cackled, drawing him down to sit with her and looping the elastic band of a second party hat under his chin. “I’m spoiling us because I don’t have a girlfriend to spoil anymore.”

“Wait, what? You and Stevie broke up?”

“Like, weeks ago,” Charlie said, waving it off. “It doesn’t matter.”

“Yes it fucking does? What happened?”

“Nothing big, we just weren’t as compatible as we were hoping. It wasn’t messy or anything. We just agreed we’re better as friends. That’s so not what I want to talk about! Tell me how your first day back on set went!”

Dean looked at her for a minute, trying to gauge whether she was burying pain or just not dwelling on something she’d already worked through. It could be hard to tell with her. But she was bouncing and smacking at his arm while she filled up their champagne glasses, so he let it go and told her about his day. He also slid his leg into her lap so she would massage his calf and ankle. He fed her strawberries while her hands were busy.

It was a pretty perfect way to end the day, which was why it was inevitable that it wouldn’t, in fact, end well at all. Charlie had leaned over for a hug and never gotten up, so Dean had leaned back against the arm of the sofa to cuddle her. They had to take the hats off so they wouldn’t poke each other in the face. They were both a little tipsy, on the verge of falling asleep together on the sofa while Spotify serenaded them, when there was a knock on the front door.

“The fuck?” Dean groaned, giving Charlie a squeeze as she startled against him. “What time’s it?”

“Late,” Charlie said, scrubbing her hands over her face and grabbing her phone from the coffee table. “Almost two.”

“Better not be that crackhead from the second floor,” Dean muttered as he limped to the door. Charlie held her phone at the ready in case she needed to call 9-1-1. He looked through the peephole and froze. “Oh, shit. Um, it’s okay, Charlie.”

“Is it?” she asked shrilly, but Dean was already unlocking the door and releasing the chain.

“Hey, Castiel,” Dean said, heart in his throat. It wasn’t butterflies, not this time. It was just plain worry.

“Hi,” Castiel said. He had one hand leaned against the wall and was gnawing viciously on a fingernail on his other hand. He’d bitten it down to the quick and it was bleeding, but that didn’t seem to phase him. He was breathing hard and fast; his pupils were enormous. “Uh, sorry. Shit, it’s late, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, it is,” Dean said, making sure he didn’t open the door wide enough for Castiel to get inside or have access to Charlie. “What are you doing here?”

Castiel plucked fitfully at a sweat-drenched black t-shirt. “I took some molly and my heart is exploding and I’m freaking out.”

“Okay, and?”

“Meg tried to make me go home and I told her that she was a bitch and she got mad and ditched me. I tried to take an Ativan to calm down but it’s not working.”

Dean looked over his shoulder at Charlie, who held up her phone with wide eyes. He shook his head.

“Yeah, amphetamines and benzodiazapenes are not a winning combo. Let me guess: you’re also drunk?”

Castiel let out a manic, humorless giggle and booped Dean on the nose. “Yep.”

Dean slapped his hand aside. “You can’t show up at my house in the middle of the night when you’re on a bender, asshole. What the hell?”

Castiel stuck his bloody finger back between his teeth and started chewing again. “Yeah, okay. I’ll go. I can go. I just… I need to calm down. And nobody will find me here because they don’t know that I talk to you. It’s late, right? I’m sorry. I’ll go.”

Dean looked at Charlie again. She had let her phone fall to the side, and looked sad instead of scared. When she met Dean’s eyes, she nodded.

“Fuck,” Dean said, and took a step back. “Just come in, before the neighbors complain about the noise.”

Castiel’s already wide eyes went wider. “Are you sure?”

Dean answered by grabbing his bleeding hand out of his mouth and using it to pull him inside. The idiot could barely keep his feet under him, and Dean aimed them both at the sofa so that if Castiel made them fall, at least no one would get hurt.

Charlie came over with a glass of water. Castiel stared at it for a few long seconds before finally seeming to realize it was for him. He chugged it down quickly and started rolling the glass across his flushed cheeks. He was still breathing too fast.

“Thank you, Charlie,” he said. “I like your pajamas.”

“Thanks, Cas,” she said. “Do you want to try to eat something? I can make you a sandwich.”

In response, his face screwed up. “No. Actually, I’m going to throw up, maybe?”

“Not in here, you’re not,” Dean said immediately, hauling himself back to his feet and dragging Castiel with him. “Sorry,” he said to Charlie as they passed her.

“Don’t be sorry,” she said. “You’re not the one who showed up in the middle of the night high off his tits.”

“I fed the stray,” he muttered as he limped to the bathroom.

Castiel seemed to have already forgotten what they were doing by the time they got there.

“You’re in a hurry to get me alone,” he said, and started clumsily trying to slide his hands up into Dean’s shirt.

Dean pushed him off. “Knock that off.”

“Why?” he laughed, trying to reach around to cop a feel instead.

This was such bullshit. Castiel didn’t even want him, he was just high as fuck and wanted to feel good. Dean wasn’t interested in being groped by someone whose only current criteria for a partner right now was ‘sentient.’

“I’m not doing this with you right now, man,” Dean said. “Not while you’re this out of it.”

Castiel paused to stare at him. He was still breathing too fast, his face flushed and sweaty. Suddenly his hands came up again, but instead of trying to paw at Dean’s body, he used them to cup Dean’s face. Dean froze.

“You’re a good man, aren’t you?” Castiel asked nonsensically.

Dean was tongue-tied.

Castiel leaned in and planted a somewhat sloppy kiss on him. Dean had abruptly had all he could take. He shoved Castiel into the shower and turned it on. Castiel yelped as the cold water hit him, but after a moment he slid his way down the wall and hunkered on the bottom of the tub, letting the water drench his clothes and hair.

“Feels good,” he mumbled. “I’m so hot.”

Then he jerked forward onto his hands and knees and started puking.

“Awesome,” Dean said.

“Not really,” Castiel moaned.

Dean left the water on so it would rinse the vomit away, but he angled the showerhead so it wasn’t actively soaking Castiel anymore. He used the grab bar to slowly sit down on the closed lid of the toilet, fighting a sympathetic nausea response and trying not to look. This was fucking dumb teenager shit, he thought. It was the kind of thing he and Jo and Lee had all done for each other a few times, back in Kansas, so there was a bitter-edged nostalgia to this ritual. At least he wasn’t worried about anyone’s parents catching them anymore.

“Hey,” he said when the vomiting seemed to have stopped. “How’re you doing?”

“Terrible,” Castiel said. “But I think it was mostly a panic attack.”

“You feel calmer now?”

“Yeah,” Castiel, miserably hunched forward and letting cool water stream through his hair and down his face. “I always feel calmer when I’m with you.”

Dean had to remind himself that this whole episode was pissing him off. He didn’t want to let Castiel off the hook just because Castiel was saying shit like that and making Dean’s stomach go warm and fuzzy.

Castiel’s phone started buzzing. Dean could see it lit up in the back pocket of his pants. At least Castiel’s ass wasn’t directly getting hit by the shower and his phone wasn’t getting thoroughly soaked.

“Shit, s’probably Meg,” Castiel mumbled. “Can you get that?”

Dean didn’t figure there was much reason to stand on ceremony, at this point, so he didn’t really think much of just sticking his hand into Castiel’s pocket and grabbing the phone.

“Hello?”

“Thank fuck,” said a deep, feminine voice. “I’ve been trying to call you for ages! Where are you?”

“Who am I speaking to?”

“Who am I speaking to? Where’s Cas? If you’ve done anything to him I swear to fuck I’ll find you and kill you.”

“Charming,” Dean said. “Are you Meg? He’s right here, he’s just puking.”

“Is he still at the club? I already looked in all the bathrooms twice.”

“No, he’s at my apartment. I’m Dean, by the way.”

There was a beat of silence. Then she said, “Dean Winchester?”

“Do we know each other?”

“No. I want to talk to Cas. Now.”

Dean was feeling slightly defensive of his territory right now, but Meg probably felt the same way. And yeah, if Castiel had been with her and then disappeared, she had the right to be worried. So Dean pushed the phone at him and turned off the water. “Talk to her. I’m getting you some clothes to change into, okay?”

Castiel nodded wearily, sitting back on his butt and leaning against the wall of the tub for support as he put the phone clumsily to his face. Dean went and grabbed his Scooby-Doo themed pajama pants and an old Coachella t-shirt, figuring that Castiel was in the middle of a sensory nightmare right now and might appreciate the softest clothes Dean had. Castiel had already finished talking to Meg by the time he returned.

“She’s coming to pick me up,” he said. “I hope it’s okay that I told her where you live.”

Dean felt another wave of possessiveness cresting through him. Castiel had activated his stupid protective streak and there was nothing Dean could do about it now. “She doesn’t need to. We’re taking care of you.”

“I told her, but she worries.”

“Is she your girlfriend?”

“Mmm. No. Friends with benefits. Less of the benefits lately. She doesn’t like the way I’ve been acting.”

“Buddy, I’m not even sure you like the way you’ve been acting. If you’re done puking, you can actually get out of those clothes and shower for real. There’s some stuff here for you to change into, and the toothbrush you used last time you slept over.”

“Okay.”

Dean left him to it and went to find Charlie to tell her the good news about getting an additional visitor. He found her at the kitchen table on her laptop, Googling what to do about MDMA overdose.

“Don’t freak yourself out with that,” he said, groaning as he lowered himself into another chair. “He’s okay.”

Charlie closed the laptop and dropped her head down to rest on it. “What the hell?”

“I know.”

“No, Dean, seriously, what the hell?”

“I don’t know,” Dean said. “Maybe the mysterious Meg can tell us more.”

“Who?”

“I think her and Castiel, are, like… a situationship? I don’t know. She was with him and she freaked out that he left, and she’s coming over right now.”

“This is my apartment, Dean Winchester. I live here. It’s not a freaking way station.”

“Believe me, I’m not thrilled either.”

There was a knock at the door before they could get any farther with that conversation. Dean started to get up, but Charlie pushed him back into his seat.

“I know you’re hurting, I got this.”

She was still wearing the fucking unicorn onesie, Dean realized with giddy three a.m. amusement as Charlie looked through the peephole. She turned and gave Dean a wide-eyed look. Oh my god, she mouthed.

Dean saw what she meant when she opened the door. Castiel’s friend was drop-dead gorgeous in a tight leather jacket and painted-on jeans, and the cherry-red smile she turned on Charlie was slow and devilish. Charlie was sure as hell smiling back.

“Hello, you must be Meg,” Charlie said, eyes looking her up and down. “You’re looking unfairly good for this time of night.”

“Hello, yourself,” Meg purred. “I seem to have lost my date for the night, and I could use a new one. Whadda ya say?”

Charlie rolled her eyes, but Dean also saw her tuck a bit of hair behind her ear. Because everyone Dean knew was making great decisions tonight, apparently.

“Hi, Meg,” Castiel said, stepping out from the bathroom in Dean’s pajamas with a towel thrown over his wet hair.

Meg hurried over to Castiel and wrapped him up in a tight hug. Seeing the way Castiel welcomed it, Dean relaxed just the tiniest bit. “You scared the bejeezus out of me, you know that? I told you to slow your roll, and next thing I know you’re gone.”

“Sorry,” Castiel said.

“You feel okay now?”

“No, I feel like dogshit,” he responded. “I need aspirin and sleep so bad.”

“Those things can be yours for the low, low price of buying me doughnuts in the morning,” Charlie said. “Not just any doughnuts, mind you. You have to get them from Sidecar.”

“A woman of class,” Meg said. She left an arm around Castiel’s waist and started directing him toward the door. “Come on, let’s get you back to my place to sleep this off.”

“I already told him he could stay here,” Dean said.

“Then what did I come all this way for?”

“I told you not to,” Castiel grumbled.

“Look, you’ve made enough of a mess for one night, babe, let’s go.”

Dean dragged himself to his feet. “Hey. If he doesn’t want to leave, then he doesn’t have to. Okay?”

“Does this have to be a big deal?” Castiel asked.

“Look,” Charlie said, watching Dean and Meg bristle at each other. “Meg, why don’t you just stay, too? You’re probably exhausted, right?”

“What, are we having a fucking slumber party?” Dean said, throwing up his hands. “We only have one couch!”

Meg had stopped and was eyeing said couch. “It’s a tempting offer, Twilight Sparkle.”

“If you’re sleeping on the couch, where is Castiel gonna sleep?”

“I assumed Castiel could bunk with you, loverboy,” Meg said, lifting an eyebrow.

Dean pointed a finger in her face. “That’s not—shut the fuck up. It’s fine. He can sleep in my room, it’s whatever. I’m too tired to argue about this. Come on, Cast- uh, Cas, let’s go.”

He put his hands on Castiel’s shoulders and turned him around and pushed him toward the bedroom, ignoring the way Meg and Charlie were both badly hiding smiles behind him. Castiel, for his part, went willingly.

“I will do whatever it takes to make everyone stop shouting,” Castiel said, letting Dean push him through the bedroom doorway. “My head hurts so bad.”

“I’d give you an Oxy, but I think it might kill you with everything else you’ve got in your system,” Dean said while digging into his box of pills and paraphernalia.

“Dying sounds so good right now,” Castiel said, collapsing onto Dean’s bed.

“Don’t fucking joke about that.”

“Who says I’m joking?” he said, looking up at Dean’s ceiling. He looked terrible, like a wrung-out dish towel, and Dean didn’t like the fact that he was avoiding eye contact when he said something like that.

Dean took his box of stuff and marched it straight to Charlie’s room, where she was pulling out some pajamas for Meg. “Keep this in here with you tonight, please.”

She gave him a long, searching, sorrowful look, and took it without saying anything. He pressed a kiss to her disheveled hair and left before she could ask him any questions that he wasn’t sure how to answer.

Castiel was splayed out loosely on the bed and still staring at the ceiling when Dean came back in. “I don’t know why you’re being kind to me. I’m a piece of shit.”

Dean threw the pill bottle at him. “Take your goddamn aspirin and go to sleep. You’re going to feel better tomorrow.”

He started to lower himself down into the bed, and Castiel scrambled up with his hands out like he thought Dean needed help. Dean waved him off, and slowly started pushing all his pillows around into the exact configuration that would keep him from being in too much pain to sleep. Once he was finally situated, he turned back to Castiel. They just watched each other for a moment.

Castiel had gone more still than Dean had ever seen him before. No nervous tics. He hadn’t even gone for a cigarette. Dean kind of got it, now. It sucked, obviously, but he could understand why somebody would put themselves in bad situations, if it was the only time they could fucking relax.

“I don’t think you’re a piece of shit,” Dean said.

“Thank you, Dean,” Castiel murmured. Then he closed his eyes, and seemed to fall asleep in mere moments.

His hand was laying limply atop the bedding near his face. Dean’s hand crept out to lay next to it. Their pinkies were so close together that Dean could feel the warmth of Castiel’s hand. Not quite touching. Not quite.

When Dean woke up in the morning, his bed was empty. His heart leapt into his throat and he fumbled for the grab bar to help himself up, cursing and keeping a hand to the wall as he limped down the hall with his right foot buzzing with pins and needles.

“Castiel! Cas!”

“Good morning, loverboy,” Meg purred from the corner of the living room sofa. She was curled up in Charlie’s other kigurumi that looked like a panda bear, eating a doughnut that presumably came from the white box on the coffee table. Castiel was stretched out on the rest of the sofa, seemingly asleep, with his head in her lap and his feet propped on the armrest. He startled awake from the noise and sat up so abruptly that Meg’s doughnut left a glob of frosting in his hair.

“Dean?” he asked blearily.

“Oh,” Dean said, feeling unbelievably stupid. “Never mind.”

“Pop a squat, have a doughnut,” Meg said, scratching idly at the hint of five o’clock shadow on her jaw. “I made coffee.”

Charlie emerged from the bedroom just then, making straight for said coffee. Dean was still trying to catch up to the shock of waking up in a state of fear like that. His heart was still pounding a little too fast. Castiel had just been joking last night, he told himself. He didn’t need to make a big deal out of everything.

“Cas,” Charlie said, her voice trembling a little around the edges as she took a sip from her mug. “Can you please tell me that what happened last night was really out of the ordinary?”

Castiel gave her a puzzled look.

“You were… that was dangerous. It could have been a lot worse.”

“If you think that was bad,” Meg started, then quelled when Castiel’s eyes narrowed at her. She sighed, and shoved another doughnut into her mouth.

“Charlie,” Castiel sighed, sounding weary. “I know you’re not naïve, so I’m not going to pretend you are. If it upsets you to see me like that, then just tell me not to come here.”

“And then what? Some stranger takes advantage of you because you don’t have a safe place to go?”

Castiel shrugged, and Dean’s stomach flipped over. “I don’t think it counts as taking advantage if I know it’s likely to happen and I do the drugs anyway.”

Charlie burst into tears, and Castiel’s eyes went wide with surprise and maybe a hint of panic. Dean started limping toward her, but Meg vaulted over the arm of the sofa and got to Charlie before Dean could.

“Sweet girl,” Meg murmured, gathering her up. “It’s all right.”

Dean whirled around to glare at Castiel.

“You’re welcome to retract that statement about me not being a piece of shit,” Castiel offered, looking like he might cry, too. His hands were twitching toward Meg and Charlie like he wanted to add himself to the hug but wasn’t sure how.

He was still wearing Dean’s Scooby Doo pajamas.

“No, you’re just a fucking idiot,” Dean said, then turned around and went back into his bedroom. He slammed the door behind him and threw himself down onto his bed. “Wake me up next year, I’m done with this one,” he mumbled to no one.

He didn’t get much of a chance to wallow before his phone started ringing.

“You have to be kidding me with this shit,” he growled, dragging himself half-upright to grab his phone from the wireless charger on his nightstand.

It was Sam. Anyone else, he would have ignored, but that was weird enough to override his other current issues.

“Why are you calling me, what’s wrong with texting?” he said as soon as he picked up the call.

“You don’t answer my texts,” Sam said.

“Touché. So what’s up?”

“I literally can’t deal with Mom being passive aggressive about Thanksgiving anymore. Can you please just give her a solid answer about whether you’re coming next week?”

“I will give you the same answer I gave her the last two times she’s asked,” Dean said, popping up from the bed so he could start pacing laboriously across the small stretch of available carpet. “If somebody wants to drive out and get me, I’ll be there. Everybody damn well knows I can’t get on a plane, my doctor hasn’t cleared me to drive, and even if she had, I can’t afford to rent a car to get there.”

Sam sighed, long and loud, one of those I’ve suffered more than Jesus sighs because Sam was a spoiled brat.

“I didn’t know it was a transportation issue,” he said. “Mom didn’t say that part.”

“Dad was supposed to drive the car back out to me like two months ago,” Dean said, and immediately felt like he was whining. “But I guess he’s been busy or something.”

“I would do it, Dean, I swear,” Sam said, sounding distracted, “but I can’t take time off that easily, either.”

“It’s not like I have a ton of free time, either,” Dean lied. “I’ve started picking up acting roles again now that I can walk better.”

“That’s great, Dean. Look, can’t you just fly this one time? I know you have a phobia or whatever, but you could just take a Xanax and deal. It’s not even a long flight.”

“Don’t start,” Dean said. “I get that shit enough from Mom and Dad, I don’t need it from you.”

“Well, damn, Dean, sorry, but sometimes I wonder if you even want to see us! You won’t even make an effort!”

It was like waving a red flag at a bull. Dean didn’t even realize he’d tipped over the edge of his anger into dangerous territory before it was too late.

“That’s fucking bullshit!” he shouted. “I came home three times last year, and I keep inviting you guys to come see me but it took me getting hit by a fucking car before you’d fucking bother!”

“That’s not fair!” Sam said. “I have school, and it’s expensive, and I have to put in a lot of work hours between semesters to help Mom and Dad with my tuition! I can’t just take off whenever I want!”

“And you think I can?”

“Well, Dean, you pretend to be other people for a couple of hours at a time, I’m training to save the lives of animals. You tell me!”

“You son of a bitch,” Dean gasped, so angry that it stole his breath.

“No, wait, I didn’t—”

Dean ended the call and stood there in his room, shaking. Before he could stop himself, he let out a yell and threw his phone at the wall. It bounced off and fell somewhere beneath his bed.

He kicked his laundry hamper because the ringing in his head made him forget what a bad idea that was. “Fuck!” he shouted as nerve pain went shooting up his leg, bad enough that he collapsed onto the bed yet again. “Shit, fuck, balls and ass,” he panted.

He saw movement in the corner of his eye, and realized with a sinking feeling that Castiel was coming into the room.

“Dean,” he said in an alarmed tone. “Are you hurt?”

“No. Just go away; I don’t want to yell at you.”

Castiel smirked like he found that funny. “Are you sure?”

“Listen,” Dean said, scrambling to sit up, heart rate climbing again as he remembered Castiel’s ‘joke’ from last night. He knew bringing it up outright would just lead to Castiel brushing it off, but he had to say something. “It’s fine. It’s good, actually.”

“What’s good?” Castiel asked, closing the door and coming over to sit next to him on the bed.

“You needed help, and you came here,” Dean said. “That’s good. I want you to do that.”

Castiel looked at him in the long, careful way that he did when he was gauging how serious Dean was about something. “Thank you,” he said.

“You’d better figure out how to fix this with Charlie, though, because I could fucking deck you for making her cry.”

“I think I might let you,” Castiel sighed, sinking down to sit next to him on the bed while Dean internally berated himself for trying to reassure Castiel and then immediately sticking his damn foot in his mouth. “I tried to apologize, but I don’t think it’s the right moment. Am I allowed to apologize to you?”

“If you feel like you need to,” Dean said,. He wasn’t putting a lot of weight into the way Castiel had kissed him last night, so it was honestly the least of his concerns. It wasn’t like Dean hadn’t known Castiel was fucked up, so he didn’t get to complain about it now.

“I do,” Castiel said. He fidgeted, tapping at his legs. His smokes had gotten soaked last night, and Dean’s weed stash was in Charlie’s room. Dean wasn’t feeling inclined to offer to get any for him. “I’m sorry for the way I behaved. I thought you already knew what I am, but maybe you only found out last night. You didn’t have to be kind to me, but you were. Thank you.”

“I don’t know what you think you are,” Dean said, suddenly worried that he was going to join Charlie in crying. “But I’m pretty sure it’s not very accurate.”

Castiel gave him a sad smile. “I’m just like everybody else in my family,” he said. “I thought I wasn’t, but I am.”

“Well, that’s your opinion, but it’s bullshit,” Dean said.

“You have a different one?” Castiel asked, looking amused.

“Yeah, I do. I think if you were like them, it wouldn’t bother you so much. And you wouldn’t be here.”

Castiel looked at him in the long, careful way that he did when he was gauging how serious Dean was about something. “Maybe you’re right.”

“I’m always right,” Dean joked, nudging him.

Castiel smiled a little. “Do you want to talk about your thing now?”

“My thing? What thing?”

“You were upset, when I came in. I thought you’d hurt yourself.” 

“Oh,” Dean said, feeling his face flushing again with embarrassment just as the flush of anger had faded. “It’s nothing. Just family stuff.”

“I have a feeling our definitions of family stuff may be somewhat different,” Castiel said dryly.

“Oh, well, some of my cousins, I tell you what,” Dean tried to joke, but trailed off. “I was supposed to go back to Kansas for Thanksgiving.”

“But?”

Castiel had fixed him with this look like there was nowhere else he’d rather be than right here, listening to Dean’s stupid petty problems. And Dean, sap that he was, told him. About John’s promise to take care of the car and bring her back, about the way they didn’t understand how crippling his phobia about planes actually was.

He could feel the burn of tears again. “They just… don’t get me. They don’t even like me, man. They never have. And nobody will take two days out of their lives to bring me back my car, and it doesn’t even matter because I’m never going to be able to drive again.” He was tired, and his emotions were out of control, and his leg hurt. He started crying. Yes, he was sensitive, and soft, and weak, and he couldn’t stop himself from crying when he was upset.

Castiel put a hand on his shoulder, warm and broad, and Dean leaned into the comfort.

“Sorry,” he said through tears. “My dad never keeps his promises, why would he keep this one? That’s my fault for being stupid enough to believe him.”

“No,” Castiel said. “That’s not your fault. You’ve been in the hospital and in recovery from a major injury, Dean, and you were relying on your dad for his help and he didn’t give it to you. That’s his fault.”

Dean didn’t really talk about his family stuff, not even with Charlie. They had an understanding about occasional nights with comfort movies and junk food when they needed to not-talk about something. But here Castiel was, listening and agreeing with him even though Dean felt like Castiel ought to be telling Dean to be thankful that his family was as functional as it was.

“It doesn’t even matter whose fault it is,” Dean said, pinching the bridge of his nose to try to stop his tears. “Dwelling on it won’t get Baby to California or me to Kansas. Maybe I’ll talk to my doctor about prescribing me something for anxiety and see if I can hack it on a plane. What’s a five-hour-long panic attack in the grand scheme of things?”

“You shouldn’t have to put yourself through that,” Castiel said, his hand firm and comforting on Dean’s back. “You’ve been through enough lately.”

“Thanks.”

“I don’t need thanks for simply acknowledging that you’ve been having a terrible time. In fact, you should still be angry at me for my role in it.”

“Castiel,” Dean said firmly, anger flaring right back up while his emotions were still heightened. “I swear to God, if you keep taking the blame for what Gabe did, I’m going to lose it. You keep thinking you have to make it up to me or something, and you don’t. This obligation crap has to stop. You either want to be here because you want to be here, or you get the fuck out and don’t talk to me again.”

“Is that what you think?” Castiel asked. “That I feel obligated to help you?”

“Don’t you?”

“Maybe I do, somewhat,” Castiel said. “But you can’t believe that’s all there is to it when I show up here like I did last night.”

“Yeah, that wasn’t your finest hour.”

Castiel let out a mirthless laugh. “I’ve been worse, most of the time, lately. But Dean, you have to realize that I simply… like being here. With you.”

“Oh,” Dean croaked. The fucking butterflies were back, which was just fantastic. He was red-eyed from crying, Castiel was exhausted and nursing a headache, they were both in pajamas, and—

“You, uh. Have frosting in your hair,” Dean said, and reached up to touch the sticky, sugary clump in Castiel’s already-terrible bedhead.

“Fucking Meg,” Castiel muttered, reaching up to touch it, too, and bumping their fingers together. Dean froze, then pulled his hand back.

“Dean, I…” Castiel trailed off, staring closely at Dean’s mouth.

“Yeah?” Dean said, staring back.

Castiel abruptly stood up. “I need to make a phone call.”

“What?” Dean asked in disbelief.

“A phone call. I need to see whether Anna and Inias can take a few things off my hands so that I can take vacation next week.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I’m going to drive you to Kansas to get your car back.”

“You fucking what?”

Castiel knelt down on the ground and stuck his head and hand under the bed and retrieved Dean’s phone for him. “Here, by the way.”

“Castiel,” Dean said firmly. “You can’t just… volunteer to take a week off and drive me halfway across the country.”

Castiel tilted his head a bit and gave Dean a look of pure curiosity. “Why not?”

“What do you mean why not?”

“Why can’t I do that for you, if I want to?”

“Because you have a really important job and a really demanding boss?” Dean said. “Because nobody in their right mind wants to be stuck in a car with me for the better part of a week?”

Castiel nodded. “Good thing I’m not in my right mind, then,” he said as he walked over to the window and climbed out onto the fire escape. He smirked at Dean’s gaping face. “Go get a doughnut before Meg eats the whole box,” he said, already thumbing through his phone’s contacts. “This might take me a while.”

Chapter Text

Neither Dean nor Castiel could be said to be an early bird, but traffic in L.A. waited for no man, so they hit the road at 5:30 a.m. with two of the largest coffees that McDonald’s offered and a bag full of breakfast sandwiches and hash browns, Charlie’s sleepy goodbye kisses lingering on their cheeks.

Dean was actually in fine form, having smoked a joint and gone to bed early. He was queuing up one of the playlists he’d made for their trip and drumming on the dashboard. Castiel, however, was hunched silently over his coffee, eyes squinted behind a pair of sunglasses and sporting the worst case of bedhead that Dean had ever seen. He kept glaring at Dean and pointedly reaching out to turn the volume down again.

“Aw, don’t be like that, sunshine,” Dean laughed, fishing into the bag of food and unwrapping a McMuffin for him. “Road trips are the best; you’ll see.”

Castiel had never driven farther than San Francisco, apparently, and Dean did not agree that it even counted as a road trip if it took less than six hours.

“Let’s make a deal,” Castiel said in a raspy voice. “I will be very enthusiastic about road trips with you if, and only if, you are very quiet until we get to Barstow.”

“Barstow’s almost two hours from here,” Dean protested.

“Yes. I know.”

Dean pouted at him, but Castiel’s face didn’t crack even a little. So he slumped down in his seat and put his headphones in. “Fine. Be that way.”

He listened to music and played mindless games on his phone for a while, but he kept an eye on Castiel, hoping he’d perk up once he’d finished his coffee and got past San Bernardino. But as they drove on, Castiel just looked worse, if anything. Dean couldn’t tell much past the sunglasses, but he was kind of slumped against his window and his face was grim.

“Dude,” Dean said, pausing his playlist, “are you hungover?”

“No. I’m counting the minutes until we get to Barstow and I can have a cigarette.”

They needed to drive a car that they could leave behind in Kansas, since Dean still wasn’t cleared for driving on his own and would need Castiel to drive Baby on the way back. So this car was a rental, which was probably why Castiel wasn’t smoking in it. Why he’d decided he couldn’t pull over for a smoke break until then, Dean had no idea, but figured that asking would just get his head bitten off.

“Man, get a nicotine patch,” Dean grumbled.

In response, Castiel silently pulled up the sleeve of his t-shirt to show off… a nicotine patch. Dean huffed out a laugh.

“Okay, okay, I’ll leave you alone,” he said.

He started his music again, but kept watching Castiel. He was moving restlessly and grimacing a lot. Dean was amply aware of Castiel’s substance abuse problems, but he hadn’t realized he couldn’t get through even a couple of hours. The more he watched, the less sure he was that Castiel’s problem was about needing a smoke. He kept pressing one hand to his side while the other stayed on the steering wheel, and he looked like he was in pain.

Dean paused his music again.

“Hey,” he said carefully. “You said it wasn’t a big deal to ask for a week off. You said your dad was going to think it was a good thing if you wanted to get your head on straight.”

Castiel pursed his lips and said nothing.

“I’m guessing you were wrong?”

“It’s none of your business, Dean.”

“It is if it’s my fault,” Dean said. Castiel was driving, so Dean didn’t want to surprise him. He moved his hand over slowly, letting Castiel see it coming, before he lifted up the side of Castiel’s shirt. Castiel just sat there with his jaw set and eyes hidden as Dean took in the kaleidoscope of purple, red, and black splashed over his ribs. “Jesus. Are any of them broken?”

“No.”

“Did you go to urgent care?”

“No.”

“Then how do you know if any of them are broken?”

Castiel suddenly flipped on his turn signal and cut across two lanes of traffic in the kind of maneuver that had Dean gripping at the console and holding his breath. He took an exit ramp, drove until there was somewhere to turn off, and parked the car on a random street. Castiel got out of the car and lit a cigarette with his back turned to Dean.

Dean just sat and waited. He’d crossed a line, but hopefully not so badly that Castiel was ready to call the whole thing off. Dean didn’t really want to be stranded in Oak Hills and have to explain to his family that he wasn’t coming, after all.

Castiel finished his cigarette, stamped it out, then picked it up and dropped it into their bag of McDonald’s trash. Dean tried not to find it cute that even in such a bad mood, Castiel cared about not littering, but he failed miserably. He hid his smile behind his hand so he wouldn’t piss Castiel off further. Castiel slid back into the car with a grunt of pain, and took off his sunglasses so he could fix Dean with the full might of his piercing gaze. It wasn’t made less effective by the reveal of a swollen black eye, and Dean caught his breath.

“Let’s get something clear. I don’t owe you a conversation about this. But you seem to think I’m some kind of moron, so go ahead. Get it out of your system.”

“No,” Dean said. “I don’t think that. I just… look, you’re my friend. I care about you. And I don’t think it’s wrong to be worried if my friend is getting the shit kicked out of him.”

Castiel’s face changed, while Dean spoke. His scowl faded and his eyes softened.

“That’s kind of you to say,” he said. “You’re my friend, too.”

Dean figured that was supposed to be placating, but it just pissed him off. “Okay, so talk to me!” he exploded. “Why do you let him do this to you? You’re a grown man. You’re bigger than he is. You could stop him!”

Castiel looked away. “Would you?” he asked.

“Would I what?”

“Would you fight your father? Ever? Even if he hit you first?”

There was a ‘yes’ on the tip of Dean’s tongue. Yes, he’d fight like hell if anyone tried to beat him up. He had, a few times, in stupid fights in high school or at a bar with Lee. But he knew better. He knew that if John had ever hit him, Dean would have rolled over and let him.

He didn’t answer, which of course was answer enough. He already knew why Castiel wouldn’t involve the police—it wasn’t any easier to contemplate than hitting back, and besides, what good would it do when his family practically controlled the justice system in this town?

“Why can’t you just… leave?” Dean asked. “Just fucking… tell him to shove it where the sun doesn’t shine, go work at some other firm? Hell, leave L.A.?”

Castiel stared out of the windshield for a bit, looking at nothing but houses and driveways and lawns. Dean thought he would speak a few times, but he didn’t. Eventually he turned the car back on and started navigating them back to I-15. Dean was frustrated as hell, but he bit his tongue. Castiel didn’t want to talk about it anymore, and Dean had to respect that if he wanted this friendship, or at the very least this road trip, to last.

After a couple of miles, Castiel suddenly asked, “What do people do on road trips, anyway?”

It was an olive branch if Dean had ever heard one.

“Oh, we got options,” Dean said. “You want music, a stupid car game, or for me to find the dumbest tourist thing nearby for us to pull over and look at?”

Castiel smiled a little. “Car game. We already pulled over.”

“That doesn’t count!”

Castiel’s smile got wider. “How dare you disparage the majesty of the suburban neighborhood? There was a basketball hoop in someone’s driveway. It was beautiful.”

“Oh my god,” Dean said. “If you don’t want me to think you’re a moron, you’re not really helping your case, man.”

“Come on, Dean. I want to play a stupid game.”

“Okay, okay. Do you want I Spy, or the alphabet game?”

Castiel won the alphabet game twice in a row, and when Dean accused him of not keeping his eyes on the road, he just grinned and said they could try for best three out of five. Dean switched them over to Twenty Questions, but when Castiel realized all of Dean’s prompts were for old Hollywood celebrities that he’d never heard of, he declared Dean impossible to play games with and told him to put some music on.

Dean put on his “80s Jamz” playlist and turned it up loud. It was loaded up with everything: Duran Duran, Madonna, Michael Jackson, Van Halen, Whitesnake, all the good stuff. Castiel refused to sing along, but he seemed to get a kick out of watching Dean jam out, drumming on the dashboard and banging his head.

“It’s gonna take money-y-y,” Dean sang, grinning while Castiel gaped at him. “A whole lotta spending money-y-y!”

“You didn’t tell me you could sing.”

“Everybody can sing!”

“Not me.”

“Nah, come on, just do it! Gonna take patience and ti-i-ime!”

Castiel shook his head, but Dean kept pushing an imaginary microphone up to his mouth until Castiel gave in.

“Got my mind set on you,” he rumbled, very off-key.

“Oh god,” Dean choked, giggling. “Oh, no.”

“I told you.”

“Don’t worry, it’s enthusiasm that counts with car singing! It don’t matter that you can’t carry a tune in a bucket!”

“If you say so.”

“Come on, Cas! Got my mind se-e-et on you!”

Castiel joined in, more humming than singing, and it sounded like a rock falling down a hill or something, but Dean didn’t care. The point was to make sure Castiel was having fun, not get him to audition for The X Factor.

Dean was using the bouncing around and singing to cover up for how much pain had started making him squirm. They were supposed to get to Flagstaff, stop for lunch, then carry on to Albuquerque. He wasn’t sure he was going to make it. He was getting tired of his recovery taking up so much space in his life and dictating so many of his decisions, and he didn’t want Castiel to think he needed to be coddled, but he wasn’t sure how long he could ignore it.

“Hey.”

“What?”

“We’re coming up on Needles, right?”

“Yes, very shortly.”

“Look out for exit nine, we’re gonna hit the 95 South.”

“What? I thought we were supposed to stay on the I-40 for two more hours. Is there an accident ahead?”

“Just do it. Road trip reasons,” Dean said. “Look, look there it is.”

Castiel took the exit and glared at Dean from behind his sunglasses. “Where are we going?”

“Lake Havasu City!” Dean said enthusiastically.

“Why?”

“Because there’s a lake! And they have London Bridge, dude! The actual bridge from London. Some guy just, like, bought a bridge and had it fucking shipped to the middle of nowhere for shits and giggles. We gotta see it.”

Castiel seemed speechless. “… but why?”

“This is what road trips are for, Cas, we just gotta.”

“I nearly understand that. But why did someone buy…? You know, never mind. Just tell me how to get there.”

Dean gave him directions, not just into the city, but to a restaurant called Javelina Cantina, which tickled his funny bone. Castiel mocked him for pronouncing the ‘J’ wrong.

“Sue me, I don’t speak Spanish,” Dean said.

“I’m not sure there’s legal grounds to sue there,” Castiel said.

“Do you speak any other languages? Just curious.”

“A smattering of Russian. I haven’t had time to study it properly. Spanish was something I picked up for its utility. Everyone at the firm speaks one of the most widely-spoken languages in L.A.; it was part of our childhoods to develop the skill. Between all the cousins, we can speak Korean, Chinese, Vietnamese, Farsi, and Tagalog as well. Though of course Hester and Bowser didn’t wind up in the family business.”

“Who the fuck is Hester?” Dean asked as Castiel was parking the car.

Castiel looked surprised. “My younger sister. Have I not…?”

“No.”

“Oh. Well, we don’t really talk. I’m not sure why. We don’t really have anything in common, I suppose.”

“I’m sorry,” Dean said. “I’m not that close with my brother, either. Same problem, I guess.”

Castiel looked sad, but he shook it off and opened his door so he could get out and smoke. Dean opened his door, and slowly, slowly hauled himself out. The weather was pleasingly still warm and sunny, though that would change as they got closer to Flagstaff. His crutches were in the back seat, and he could tell he was going to need them even though he should be able to at least walk across a parking lot unaided. He had to lean on the car as he shuffled the few steps he needed to get the back door open, hissing as his pain spiked.

Castiel had rounded the car and put an arm around Dean’s waist before Dean even realized he’d moved. “Are you okay?”

“Fuck,” Dean said shakily. “I knew sitting for that long was gonna make me sore, but I didn’t think it would be this bad.”

“What do you need?”

“I need to lie down in the back seat and do some stretches before I try to get up again, I think.”

Castiel immediately opened the door and started moving things down into the footwell to make space for him, and then helped Dean get in. “Did you want to stop here because you were hurting?”

“Maybe,” he groaned as he went supine with his feet sticking out of the open door.

“How long can you actually sit still in the car before you should be doing some stretching or laying down?”

“I dunno, two or three hours?”

“Dean,” Castiel growled, “why didn’t you tell me that?”

Dean covered his face with one arm. “Because you’re taking time off work to do this for me and I wanted us to get there and back as soon as possible.”

“Dean,” Castiel said, then abruptly disappeared. Dean peeked out from under his arm, and didn’t see him. Then the door by his head opened, and Castiel’s face bent down over his. “Time for another very fun conversation.”

“Oh good,” Dean sighed, carefully pulling his right leg up by the thigh.

“I am here because I want to be. And I don’t care if we need to stop every ten minutes. I don’t care if we don’t get there until Christmas.”

“Oh sure,” Dean retorted. “Maybe then your dad can break the rest of your ribs.”

Castiel’s glare went so icy that it made Dean shiver.

“I need this trip just as much as you do,” he said. He abruptly turned his face away, and Dean could only see his hands. He curled them up into fists and dug his fingernails into his palms hard enough that it must have hurt. “I promised myself that I wasn’t going to be the person I’m turning into. I… I need a break. So I’m taking a break.”

Dean stretched his arm up above his head, reaching out the open door and grabbing Castiel’s wrist. He didn’t say anything. He just looked up at him and held on until Castiel’s hand relaxed.

“So we’ll take a break,” he said then.

Castiel nodded a little.

“Now come back around to the other side. I got a couple of stretches I need help with and I gotta show you how to do weird shit to my leg.”

Castiel let out a hoarse, bright laugh, and carefully palmed Dean’s head to make sure it was all the way in before closing the door on that side and circling back around.

The view of the bridge was definitely better than the fajitas they ate, but it was still a fun place to stop. The waitress gave them a double-take when she saw Dean’s scar and Castiel’s black eye, but quickly turned on a semi-genuine smile and didn’t ask them anything rude or invasive, so that was a win.

Dean took some Oxy, and they took a short walk so he could work out his stiffness. He tried to take a photo of Castiel silhouetted in front of the bridge to put on his Instagram, but Castiel freaked out and said not to, lest one of his cousins see it and realize that he and Dean were even in contact, much less on a road trip together. So Dean just took a shot of the bridge by itself.

Eventually, they got back into the car to continue on. Castiel said he was tired of music and asked Dean to read to him. Dean had the Kobo app on his phone and Castiel claimed to have no preferences, so Dean downloaded a copy of On the Road in order to finally contextualize his stupid joke from the night they met.

“‘What you could call my life on the road began when I first met Dean Moriarty, not long after my wife and I separated.’” Dean stopped reading and looked up. “You have to understand,” he said, “that I’m not really like Dean Moriarty at all, okay? I’m just named after him because my parents are freaks.”

“Okay,” Castiel said, lips twitching. “I didn’t know this book was annotated.”

“Shut the fuck up. Fine. I’ll just read. Anyway. ‘Before that, I often dreamed of going West to see the country, always planning but never going. Dean is the perfect guy for the road because he was actually born on the road, when his parents were passing through Salt Lake City in 1926, on their way to Los Angeles…’”

Dean read until his throat was sore, helping himself periodically to the cooler full of soda, water, and juice in the back seat. He read until they hit Flagstaff, where Castiel navigated them to a gas station.

“We’re stopping here for today,” he announced as he turned the car off.

“You’re kidding. It’s not even four o’clock.”

Castiel shrugged. “My ribs are killing me, your leg is killing you, and we’re not in a hurry. Who cares?”

“Good point,” Dean said, carefully getting out of the car. He felt a little better this time, and didn’t immediately reach for his crutches. “Go over there so you can smoke, I can handle getting gas.”

Castiel gave him a sarcastic salute and wandered away. Dean started thumbing through hotel options while the tank filled and found the perfect one almost immediately. He desperately needed to see this place for himself. Castiel came back over waving his phone, having either smoked really fast or having abandoned his cigarette in his excitement.

“Dean, I found an absolutely ridiculous hotel, we have to stay there.”

“No way, I found one that looks amazing, please, you gotta let me have this.”

They held their phones out simultaneously, and realized they were both looking at the same hotel. They both busted out laughing, and laughed until Castiel started wheezing and saying, “ow, ow, ow,” and clutching at his side.

“Okay, so, the hotel that looks like it walked off the set of Twin Peaks it is,” Dean said. “Apparently there’s some ancient Anasazi ruins near here, and a giant crater where a meteor hit thousands of years ago, which, cool, and there’s an observatory. You ever been to the Griffith Observatory at home?”

Castiel frowned. “Not since grade school, I think.”

“I went once, when I first moved to L.A., and it’s awesome. Do you want to try going to this one tonight?”

“Um, sure.”

Dean beamed and pointed at him. “Correct answer. You’re getting the hang of this road trip thing.”

“I was inspired by the terribly corny adventures of Sal Paradise.”

“Corny?” Dean gasped.

Castiel shrugged unapologetically. “I guess Kerouac isn’t my thing.”

“Eh, gotta admit he’s not totally mine, either,” Dean said. “I just wanted you to know what I was talking about, before.”

“When you desperately wanted my name to be Cassady.”

“I didn’t desperately want… you’re such a dick. Get in the car.”

They procured an accessible room that had grab bars in the bathroom, so that Dean wouldn’t eat shit trying to take a shower. They cleaned up a little before going back out to get dinner and visit the observatory. They took it easy and didn’t stay out long, but it was fun.

Castiel only tore himself away from the telescope because somebody else showed up who wanted to use it, stumbling back from it breathless and wide-eyed. He was quiet on their way back to the car.

“Smuggling out some stars in your eyes there, Castiel,” Dean murmured, nudging their shoulders together as they walked back to the car.

Castiel looked up with a dreamy expression. “I’d forgotten how to feel like this while sober,” he said.

“What?”

“How beautiful and impossible everything is. How someone can feel so large and so small at the same time.”

Dean stopped walking because his breath had suddenly punched out of his lungs. Castiel stopped, too, forehead crinkled with worry.

“Dean?”

“I’m okay,” he said, staring at Castiel’s moonlit profile, the bright eyes set into the shadowed angles of his face. He hadn’t wanted to kiss him so badly since the night they had met. But he couldn’t. He shouldn’t. “You just… took me by surprise.” He started walking again, and Castiel followed, quiet and lost in his own head.

They went back to the hotel and got ready for bed, but Dean noticed that Castiel had started the tapping thing he did when he was anxious. Normally he did drugs or got drunk about it, but since he’d said he wouldn’t be doing that on this trip, Dean wondered how he would handle it.

Not well, it seemed. He went out to smoke twice in the time it took Dean to shower and brush his teeth. He’d filled up a ziploc bag with ice and was icing his ribs, but he kept picking up things from his bag and putting them back, scrolling around on his phone and then tossing it down. Dean settled in to do some exercises and stretches that would help him avoid being sore and stiff in the morning, and watching him distracted Castiel for a while, but then he started moving around the room again, looking at the welcome packet, playing with the TV remote, until Dean had had enough.

“Man, I miss Charlie,” he announced loudly as he lay down across the bed he’d claimed for himself.

“She’s a delight, but it hasn’t even been twenty-four hours. Codependent much?”

“Nah, but she always massages my leg before bed.”

“Oh,” Castiel said, and drifted over toward him. “Um. I could…? If you want me to. I understand if you don’t.”

“That would be… yeah,” Dean said, feigning surprise. “If you wouldn’t mind? It helps me sleep.”

“Tell me what to do,” Castiel said, sinking down to sit beside him, hands already skating carefully over Dean’s calf.

Dean sat up and directed Castiel’s hands, explaining a little more about the lingering issues he was having as he did. Castiel’s fingers were focused and careful, and Dean eventually stopped talking because he was being overcome by relief. He flopped back onto his pillow.

“Fuck, Cas, that feels amazing,” he said.

Castiel’s hands squeezed a little too hard, and Dean heard a sharp intake of breath, but then Cas shook his head and eased up.

“You called me Cas a few times today,” he said after a minute of quiet.

“I mighta.”

“I thought you preferred my full name.”

“I guess I’m starting to think not every situation is a full name kinda situation,” Dean said, staring up at the ceiling and trying to pretend it was just Charlie’s hands on his leg.

“What’s the difference?”

Dean couldn’t answer. Castiel’s hands slowed, and stopped. He turned to look at Dean. The fingers of one hand slid slowly along the tender skin of Dean’s surgical scar. Dean shivered, and licked his lips nervously.

“We should, uh, get some sleep,” he said.

Castiel’s hands retreated. “Okay.”

They both had to take a few minutes to mess around with their pillows so they could sleep comfortably, Dean shoving the extras under his hip and knee, and Cas propping himself up to sleep reclined instead of lying down. As the fidgeting went on, Dean snickered, and then started laughing outright.

“What?” Castiel asked.

“We’re a regular couple of geriatrics, man,” Dean giggled. “Don’t forget your cholesterol medication, okay?”

Castiel coughed when he tried to laugh. “Screw you, you’re the old man here.”

“I’m twenty-six, dude.”

“I’m twenty-five,” Castiel said triumphantly. “Who’s geriatric now?” Then he coughed again, which absolutely decimated his point, and Dean laughed even harder.

“Weren’t you the one who said we needed to sleep?” Castiel growled.

In response, Dean closed his eyes and mouth and pretended to be asleep already.

“You’re such a little shit,” Castiel muttered, then reached over and turned out the lamp.

They had to skip the ruins of the old pueblo since neither of them was in shape for hiking, but they stopped to look at the meteor crater for about half an hour. It was pretty cool, and Dean sort of wished they could stay longer, but they had a four-hour drive to Albuquerque they wanted to make before two p.m.

“I think I might be in love with the desert,” Castiel said, head tipped up to the sky as they walked.

“Yeah?”

“The sky is just… so big. I feel like I’m going to fall right off the planet and float away.”

“That’s… good?”

“I know it sounds weird, but I like it.”

Dean stopped and copied Castiel, gazing up in the endless blue. Kansas could be a little like this, too, and he ended up feeling dizzy and putting a hand on Castiel’s shoulder to steady himself. “I feel more like a bug under a microscope.”

Castiel shrugged and led them back to the car. Dean kicked the day off with one of several playlists he’d made of 70’s music, letting Bob Seger, Led Zeppelin, the Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, and Bruce Springsteen serenade them down the interstate.

Castiel was quiet, but he always had a small smile on his face when Dean was singing or talking to him, and accepted a handful of whatever gas station snack Dean held out to him periodically—Dean had made a stockpile of a variety of flavors of beef jerky, Takis, and Little Debbie cakes.

They stopped at a rest area near the Petrified Forest after the first two hours of driving. He smoked, then came over to help steady Dean through his more ambitious stretches and exercises, letting Dean use his shoulders as something to lean a hand on, and catching him by the arms once when he wobbled. They didn’t make eye contact. Castiel excused himself to use the restroom, and Dean leaned against the hood of the rental car and soaked in the sunlight. It was finally starting to feel like November, so he had on a bomber jacket that Charlie had found for him in some vintage shop that he knew for a fact made his shoulders and profile look amazing.

Another car was parked near theirs, and two women around his age approached it, one of them leading a little dog with curly golden-brown fur. Dean smiled at the way it trotted at the woman’s side, little pink tongue panting. He liked dogs. He and Charlie had talked vaguely about getting a dog, but neither of them had been home often enough in the past.

He looked up to see the woman looking at him. “Hey, how you doin’?” he said with a grin, the flirtation coming as automatically and easily as breathing. But her smile was already falling when she caught a better look at him.

“No,” she said definitively, and turned to open the back door. “In, Marigold. Let’s go,” she said to the dog.

The other woman was giving Dean a pitying, grimaced smile over the roof of the car as she got in the passenger seat. “Sorry,” she mouthed while her friend’s back was turned.

Dean stared at the ground in front of his feet and willed himself to be a good actor. To show no expression, to shrug this off like it meant nothing to him. Because it didn’t mean anything, right? It was just some random woman at a rest stop in the middle of nowhere.

“What a beautiful day to be a total asshole to a stranger,” Castiel said in a loud, deadpan voice as he came strolling up, a second cigarette in his hand. “Perfect weather for making somebody feel like shit for no reason.”

The woman turned scarlet red, jumped into her car, and peeled out of her parking space in about ten seconds flat. Castiel stared after the car with his Transformers stance that made him look really intimidating, and Dean started laughing so hard that he had to slide back into the car to sit down.

“Oh my god,” he gasped, laughing even harder when he looked up and saw that Castiel was giving him a puzzled I don’t get it look. “This is the second time I’ve gotten to see you act like such a huge bitch that it made somebody literally run away from you.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Remember the tacos?”

Castiel just frowned harder. “I don’t have much patience for people who are being inconsiderate, and I’m not going to apologize for it.”

“Who’s asking you to apologize?” Dean laughed. “You’re awesome.”

Castiel’s frown suddenly cleared up, and he took a long, satisfied drag on his cigarette before stamping it out and carrying it over to a trash can.

“I’m not sure it’s my best quality,” he said after he came back and slid into the car.

“I beg to differ,” Dean said. “Since you keep using it to defend me.”

Castiel’s hand stopped in the process of turning the car on, and he turned to give Dean one of the most open, earnest looks Dean had seen from him yet. Dean’s heart started hammering, and he knew he wasn’t going to survive anything Castiel might be about to say.

“Anyway,” Dean said. “Thanks. Let’s get going. What do you want to listen to? I got a couple of early 2000’s playlists that will definitely give you complicated nostalgia about your childhood.”

“Absolutely the fuck not,” Castiel said, putting the car into motion and letting the moment go. “I think you should read some more.”

“Oh,” Dean said. “I mean, I could. Do you actually like being read to?”

“I like it when you do it,” Castiel said. “But I’d prefer a different book.”

So Dean scrolled through his library, and found The Martian because something light-hearted and entertaining might distract Dean from feeling like he was going to die if he didn’t touch Castiel immediately.

“‘Log entry: Sol 6,’” Dean read in a thick voice, then cleared his throat and took a long sip of the lemongrass-flavored water he’d grabbed because he didn’t need any more sugar or caffeine. “‘I’m pretty much screwed.’”

The book was a hit with Castiel, who said he wanted to hear some more of it later, after Dean gave his voice a break. They spent a couple of hours in Albuquerque, checking out the old town and getting some lunch. Dean was starting to feel bloated from bad road food, so they searched out a restaurant with healthier options. Castiel picked at his food with a hand pressed to his side, grimacing, so Dean charmed their waitress into bringing them a bag of ice and made him go lie down in the backseat of the car for half an hour and take some aspirin while Dean entertained himself with kitschy tourist shops.

Ketch called while Dean was debating with himself about whether Charlie, Jody, and Donna would rather receive weird-scented candles or weird-looking pottery. When he saw the name on his screen, his good mood plummeted into the earth.

“Yeah?” he answered as he limped out of the shop.

“You’re killing me, Winchester,” Ketch said immediately. “You turned down every single script I’ve sent you over the past two weeks. What gives?”

Dean wanted to fight back, but the woman’s face from the rest stop flashed through his mind, and instead of yelling, he just… gave up. “I know. I’m not used to it yet, I guess. I know I can’t get the same roles I was getting before. I just thought, there has to be something out there with some meat on it, at least. Something with more speaking lines.”

“I agree,” Ketch said obsequiously. “But we’re going to have to work up to it. I can see you making a name for yourself in the character actor niche, but it’s going to take time.”

“The scar is going to fade a little bit,” Dean said, not sure if he was saying it or pleading it. “And I’m not going to be limping for much longer. I can—I can take a couple of these smaller roles until I’m in better shape.”

“In a year or two, things could really start looking up,” Ketch said, and Dean’s stomach fell further. He’d figured on a few months, not a year or two. “Can you please deign to have a look at the ones I sent you yesterday and take at least one of them?”

Dean hadn’t even noticed Ketch had sent another batch. “Yeah, okay.”

Then the phone was plucked out of his hand, and Dean turned with a shout on his lips to see that it was Castiel, who held the phone up with a thunderous expression.

“You’re Mr. Winchester’s talent agent, yes?” he asked.

Dean, of course, could not hear Ketch’s reply.

“I’m his legal representative,” Castiel said, voice cold. “I believe that you are failing to uphold your responsibilities to my client, and we are considering whether to pursue action for breach of contract.”

Dean lunged for his phone, and almost fell over. The only reason he didn’t was because Castiel caught him with his free hand while still using the other to hold the phone to his ear.

“I appreciate your position, Mr. Ketch. We’ll be in touch.”

Castiel ended the call, and held Dean’s phone out to him.

“Dude, what the fuck?”

“Relax, I’m not actually going to do anything,” Castiel said flippantly. “I just wanted to scare him into doing his job.”

“He is doing his job, you fucking psycho!” Dean shouted.

A family with a baby stroller all turned to give him a startled, disapproving glance. Dean took a deep breath and blew it out. He was shaking.

“I’ve seen some of the movies you had roles in, Dean,” Castiel said. “I’ve seen your name mentioned in movie reviews. You’re very talented and your career is well past the point of minor roles without speaking lines.”

“My stupid face is—”

“I refuse to believe that’s how it works,” Castiel cut him off. “That someone suddenly becomes unattractive because they’ve become more interesting, because they’re a real person with a real life. How is that not an asset on the screen?”

“It just isn’t,” Dean said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I don’t know what to tell you.”

“Then Hollywood sucks and I don’t know why you’d want to have anything to do with it,” Castiel snapped. “You’re just going to let them tell you that you’re not suddenly not good enough? Fuck that!”

Dean felt the anger boiling up, and felt like he was outside of his body and watching helplessly as it took over. “Thanks for the advice about my life choices. You sure you want to open that door, Cas? You want to talk about yours next?”

Castiel turned his face aside. “That’s not what this is about.”

Dean’s hand shot out and gripped a fistful of Castiel’s shirt and shoved him back against the nearest wall. “You’re such a fucking hypocrite! You think you can just barge in and threaten all my problems into submission, but you won’t even look at your own shit! You’re just going to let it eat at you until it kills you! So fuck you!” he said, giving Castiel a little shake. “You wanna be a hammer, go pound some nails, but stay out of my life!”

Dean was expecting Castiel to argue, to shove him around or yell at him right back. To participate in the fight they were having. But Castiel was passive and silent in Dean’s grip, and his eyes were just… empty. Like he’d gone somewhere else.

Dean’s stomach turned over.

“Motherfucker, I’m such an idiot,” he said, and he willed his hands to let go of Castiel’s shirt. “Cas?”

Castiel took a step away from him. His eyes were coming back online, but his face was terrifyingly blank.

“Castiel,” Dean said. “I’m sorry. I’m pissed at you but I shouldn’t have done that.”

Castiel took another step back. “I’m going to take a walk,” he rasped. “You just… do whatever the hell you want.”

He walked away, leaving Dean standing uselessly on the sidewalk with a bunch of tourists staring at him.

“Fuck,” Dean said. He limped back to the car, figuring Castiel would return there eventually and he could just lie down and listen to some music or read or something in the meantime. The car, of course, was locked. Dean stared at his crutches in the backseat and felt an immediate twinge of pain shoot down his leg. “Ah, fuck. You stupid asshole,” he said to his reflection in the window, feeling the tears coming on. “You goddamn piece of shit.”

Dean paced and cried and cursed enough to become bored by his own bullshit, so he went back to the tourist shop and bought the souvenirs he’d been looking at, plus a bottle of water because it had been a while and he was getting thirsty. But he went back to the car as soon as possible because he was kind of freaking out with worry that Castiel was going to come back for the car when Dean wasn’t looking and ditch him in New Mexico.

Castiel didn’t come back for almost three hours. Dean had leaned his arms onto the roof of the car and put his head down on them and started doing breathing exercises to try to get through the amount of pain his leg was in. He didn’t even see Castiel until he suddenly was there, opening the door and tumbling gracelessly into the passenger’s seat.

“Let’s go,” Castiel said shortly, fumbling with his seat belt. “You’re driving.”

“… the fuck?”

“I’ve been drinking. So you’re driving.”

It took Dean a long time, hissing through his teeth, eyes smarting. Castiel looked impassively through the windshield the whole time that Dean was getting himself into the driver’s seat. He breathed deep, flexed his tingling toes inside his sneaker. He searched on his phone for the nearest hotel, hoping there was something close by. He found one, then set the phone down and stared through the windshield, too.

“Cas, I’m sorry,” he said.

“No,” Castiel said in a voice so cold that Dean immediately shut up.

The hotel wasn’t far, just four or five minutes of riding in silence so thick that Dean could barely breathe around it. Sparking bolts of pain raced down his leg, and he fumbled on the brake when they came to a stoplight. He could barely feel his foot. His heart was pounding by the time he pulled them into the hotel parking lot, and took the first free space he saw.

Dean hit the button to pop the trunk open and opened his own door, but Castiel made no move to get out. He was tapping his fingers restlessly on the dashboard. Dean eyed the shopping bag he had tucked between his legs.

“Gonna get high tonight?” he asked in a carefully neutral voice.

“Yep.”

“I’m guessing we’re getting separate rooms.”

“You know what I like about you, Dean?” Castiel asked sarcastically. “How perspicacious you are.” The million dollar word curled carefully but perfectly over his alcohol-soaked tongue.

“All right,” Dean said, and got out of the car. He took one step toward the trunk and his leg went out from under him. “Shit, shit, shit,” he gasped. He managed to catch himself against the side of the car enough to turn his body, so that it was his left leg that hit the asphalt, and he caught himself on his hands. His left hand was stinging, and he might have a bruise on his thigh, but he was at least pretty sure he hadn’t re-aggravated any of his other injuries.

Castiel was already out of the car and kneeling beside him. “Are you hurt?”

“No,” Dean said, ignoring his bloody hand. “I’m fine.”

Castiel wasn’t entirely steady on his own feet, so he just let Dean use his shoulders as leverage to get back up before standing up himself.

“Can you walk?”

“Of course I can,” Dean mumbled. “I just need my crutches.”

“You’re lying.”

“No, I’m not. Just because it’s going to fucking suck doesn’t mean I can’t do it,” Dean said. “Been doing it for months. So go on, go have your pity party, I can handle myself.”

Castiel’s eyes flashed with anger, but it quickly fizzled out. He bent into the backseat and got Dean’s crutches for him and waited while Dean got them situated on his arms.

“I’ll carry our bags,” he murmured, retrieving them from the trunk. And he walked at Dean’s side, matching his glacial pace, looking ready to catch him if he fell again.

“You don’t have to do this,” Dean said.

“I know I’m an asshole,” Castiel said, “but I’d like to think I’m not a completely irredeemable piece of shit.”

Dean huffed out a strangled laugh.

“Dean, you’re bleeding,” Castiel said, finally noticing that Dean was smearing blood on the hand brace of his crutch. 

“It’s fine.”

They’d arrived at the front doors, and Castiel immediately dumped their bags on the nearest chair in the lobby and jogged up to the front desk.

“Excuse me, would you happen to have a first aid kit?” he asked, masterfully masking his inebriation through polite, careful diction. “I need some disinfectant and bandages.”

This was clearly a nice hotel with well-trained staff, because the man at the counter retrieved a kit from the office behind him and handed it over without hesitation. “If you need medical attention, I can give you the address of the nearest urgent care, or call emergency services,” he said.

“Thank you,” Castiel said. “Just your nearest bathroom, for the moment.”

The receptionist gestured at the hallway to the left of the counter. “Right through there. Are you checked in? I can have someone take your bags straight up to your room.”

“We don’t have a reservation, but I’ll be back to check us in momentarily,” Castiel said smoothly, and came back to Dean to usher him toward the bathroom. Dean was beet red with embarrassment.

“You’re ridiculous, it’s just a scrape!”

“Let me at least look at it, and then we’ll decide if I’m being ridiculous,” Castiel argued.

Dean had to let go of the crutches in order to wash his hands, and Castiel pressed right up against his back so Dean could lean on him, one arm firmly around Dean’s waist and the other already grabbing his wrist to inspect the injury.

It was, as Dean had stated, nothing but a minor scrape on the heel of his hand that only needed a spritz of disinfectant and a basic Band-Aid. Castiel cleaned the blood off his crutch before giving it back to him, then stuck close to his side as they went back out to the lobby. He helped Dean sit down, admonishing him to stay put and take an Oxy while he checked them in.

Dean did, and felt increasingly exhausted. They were having a serious argument and were mad at each other for very valid reasons, he was pretty sure, but Castiel had just dropped the whole thing over a couple of drops of blood. It was like that night the elevator had been out all over again, with them yelling at each other, but Castiel had still carried him. It felt good to be cared about, but Dean didn’t want to get stuck in some cycle where he hurt Castiel and Castiel just let him and acted like Dean mattered more than him.

“Come on,” Castiel said, coming back over to him. “I got us a room as close as possible to the hot tub. I thought it might help you to soak for a bit.”

Dean gave him a hard look. “I thought we were getting separate rooms.”

Castiel’s eyes flicked away, and he held his hands out to help Dean get back up. He seemed steadier on his feet than he was before. Dean’s little accident seemed to be sobering him up fast. “Come on. Not here.”

Dean rolled his eyes, and let Castiel bring him to the elevator and to their room. He changed into gym shorts that would do well enough for swim trunks in the hot tub, because Castiel wasn’t wrong that it would help, while Castiel himself was pulling all their toiletries out of their bags and setting them up in the bathroom.

“Cas,” Dean called out, sitting on the bed and feeling the pain pill start to kick in with a slump of relief. “We need to talk.”

Castiel came out of the bathroom with an apprehensive look, but he sat down next to Dean anyway. He immediately started tapping his leg and fidgeting his feet.

“Do you need to get high for this?” Dean asked. “Just do it if you gotta.”

Castiel pulled a face. “I left the bag in the car.”

“Then go get it.”

“If I do, I probably won’t come back.”

Dean sighed, and put a hand on top of Castiel’s arm, bringing the tapping briefly to a halt. He saw Castiel’s little tattoo under his grip, and he couldn’t help rubbing his thumb over it.

“Got my own personal emergency medical services, huh?” he said. “What did you say this thing was called?”

“Rod of Asclepius,” Castiel answered, staring down at Dean’s hand on his arm.

“Right.”

“Dean, I do need to apologize to you for the way I behaved today. I overstepped badly, in a way that you’ve already told me once that you don’t like. I’m sorry.”

Dean pulled away completely and rubbed his hands nervously on his own thighs. “Nah, man, that’s not even… I put my hands on you. I should never—not to anybody. I’ve been having some anger issues ever since what happened.” He clutched a hand to his stomach, which rolled with nausea. “Feel sick, thinking about the way I treated you today. What if I lost my temper like that on Charlie? I just… I already knew I was letting things get out of hand. I need to get it together.”

Castiel was just watching him, poker-faced.

“Castiel,” Dean said. “I’m sorry. Really, really sorry. I’m never going to do that again. I promise.”

Castiel finally blinked. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

Castiel shrugged. “I believe you.”

Dean sighed in relief. “Okay. Then, I guess, that’s all I wanted to say.”

“If you’re sure,” Castiel said, not moving to get up.

“If I’m sure what?”

“That you don’t want to address the other elephant in the room. It’s a bit less crowded now, mind you, but still taking up some space.”

“What are you talking about?”

In answer, Castiel’s hand came up and touched Dean’s cheek. His thumb stroked softly along the line of Dean’s scar.

“I’m talking about the way you look at me,” he murmured. “And the way I look at you.”

He leaned forward until his lips were an inch from Dean’s.

“We can’t,” Dean said.

“Why?”

“You’re drunk.”

“I’m not. I promise.”

“Castiel… you didn’t even want my number that night. There was no reason we should have even seen each other again. What happened after was complete chance.”

“But it did happen. And things have changed.”

“I guess they have,” Dean murmured. Castiel’s face was so close.

“Dean.”

“Fuck,” Dean said, and leaned forward to kiss him.

Castiel wasted no time in deepening the kiss. He shifted, cupped Dean’s face in his hands and ran his tongue along the seam of Dean’s lips until Dean parted for him. Dean rested his hands at Castiel’s hips, pulling him closer until their chests were pressed together. He slid his own tongue along Castiel’s, chasing the lingering taste of the whiskey Castiel had been drinking a few hours ago, and he nipped at Castiel’s lip as he retreated for a breath.

“Been thinking about this so much,” he murmured. “Can’t stop thinking about you, Castiel.”

“Dean,” Castiel growled, and ducked his head to press a line of kisses along Dean’s throat, landed on the soft skin just below his ear at the hinge of his jaw. Dean shivered. Tilted his head back. Skated a hand over Castiel’s hipbone. “I wanted you from the moment I saw you. I never stopped.”

“Ah,” Dean gasped. He leaned back further, and a lightning bolt of pain went down his leg. “Ah,” he groaned, and Castiel was intuitive enough to hear the difference, and pulled back. “No, shit, fuck, don’t stop.”

“Only long enough to make you comfortable,” Castiel promised, hands tracing over his shoulders. “What would help?”

Dean dropped his head onto Castiel’s collarbone. “The hot tub,” he admitted.

Castiel’s hand was possessive on the back of his neck, and he pressed a kiss into Dean’s hair. “Perfect. We’ll go for a little bit, and then we’ll come back to this room, we’ll get you lying down and comfortable, and then I’m going to ride your dick like I’ve been dreaming about for months.”

“Oh my god,” Dean said into Castiel’s chest. “God, fuck, yes. Wait. Condoms.”

Castiel nipped at his ear again. “I have some in my wallet. And lube. I didn’t bring them on purpose, for the record, I just always have some.”

“You’re a regular boy scout.”

Castiel slid off the bed and helped Dean hobble down the hall to the hot tub. Castiel didn’t get in, but he bracketed his legs around Dean and dangled his feet into the water. There weren’t any other guests around, so Dean leaned his head back for more kissing. Castiel’s hands traced over Dean’s chest and shoulders and played with his hair, and Dean pressed kisses along Castiel’s thighs and ran fingers up and down his legs, circled the delicate skin of his ankles, and enjoyed the soft fuzz of hair under his hands and mouth. He liked the clean-shaven thing that most women and the occasional man he’d been with had, too, but there was something satisfying in a primal way about body hair. He’d been shockingly turned on the time he’d taken a woman to bed and found that she didn’t shave.

Castiel lifted Dean’s torso halfway into his lap and held him up so that Dean could let his legs just float in the water. He moved them slowly, carefully, and let the heat and weightlessness work out some of the kinks. He was eager to get to the good stuff, but not so eager that he’d cut this off too early and wind up in too much pain to actually follow through in bed. Besides, this was nice.

After about half an hour, they went back to their room, every nerve lit up and begging for more. Dean took a deep breath as he shed his soggy shorts and finally gave Castiel the full view of his scars. He looked at the wall over Castiel’s shoulder while Castiel looked at Dean's leg.

Castiel dropped to his knees and leaned in. Dean hadn’t been expecting to get his dick sucked, though he certainly wasn’t going to complain. But Castiel didn’t do that. He tilted his head and traced his lips slowly up the side of Dean’s leg. He had a hand braced against the back of Dean’s thigh, and the other planted against his buttock in case he needed to steady him. He kissed all up and down the scars, making Dean’s skin break out in goosebumps. Dean felt himself on the verge of tears, and clenched his jaw.

“You’re beautiful and I want to make love to you,” Castiel murmured into his groin, breath hot against Dean’s cock. “Lie down.”

Dean did, and Castiel helped him tuck every pillow from both beds around and under himself until he felt comfortable. Then Castiel climbed over him, kneeling while straddling Dean’s belly, wearing nothing but the henley shirt he’d been wearing all day. Dean licked his lips as he watched Castiel’s semi bob in front of him.

“Shirt?” Dean asked, fingers grazing the hem.

Castiel made a face. “You don’t want to look at that the whole time.”

“Castiel,” Dean murmured, reaching out and running his hands over Cas’s thighs and hips and up to his sides. “Please.”

Castiel looked at him, and Dean ran his hands slowly up under the shirt. He waited for Castiel’s nod before lifting it up, waiting for Castiel to bend and raise his arms and duck his head, letting Dean pull it off him and toss it aside. Dean didn’t look at the bruises at all, just ran his hand over Castiel’s spine and lifted his head for a kiss.

Castiel kissed him thoroughly, and slowly moved his hips back and forth to let Dean’s cock drag over his balls and along his crack. Dean couldn’t lean too far forward without setting off his nerve pain, so he gripped Castiel by the thighs and pulled him closer, until he could reach Castiel’s hole.

“Lube,” he demanded, voice rough with want.

Castiel handed it over immediately, watching avidly as Dean tore the packet open and slicked the fingers on his right hand. He pressed his face into Dean’s chest with a soft cry of pleasure when Dean’s index finger circled and pressed cautiously at his entrance.

“Get me ready fast,” he demanded, nipping at Dean’s collarbone. “I want your cock yesterday.”

Dean laughed and pressed a little harder until his finger slipped in. He didn’t go deep, just moved it in a slow circle and used his thumb to tease at Castiel’s perineum.

“Faster than that,” Castiel growled, and grabbed Dean’s wrist to force him to move his hand more aggressively.

“Holy shit, you could have mentioned what a bratty bottom you are,” Dean said, using his free hand to pinch Castiel’s asscheek.

Castiel bit his shoulder hard, making him shudder. “It’s way too late to tell me that’s a problem for you.”

“No problem,” Dean muttered, twisting his wrist to break Castiel’s grip so he could pull his finger back and join it up with a second one. “Just don’t want to hurt you, sweetheart.”

“I promise you won’t,” Castiel said. Then lifted his head so abruptly he almost headbutted Dean in the nose and glared at him. “Sweetheart?”

Dean tried to give him a teasing smile, but he knew it looked stupid and soft instead. He craned his neck to press a kiss to Castiel’s forehead. “Yeah.”

“You think I’m a dick.”

“They’re not mutually exclusive,” Dean laughed, moving his fingers slowly in and out. “You are sweet. Always letting Charlie and Meg love on you. Always trying to take care of me. Carrying me up the stairs at my apartment. Losing your mind over a little scrape on my hand.”

Castiel ducked his head back down and didn’t say anything, and after a moment Dean felt a suspicious warmth land on his chest. He didn’t call attention to Castiel’s tears, just worked him open until Castiel grabbed his wrist again and yanked his hand away.

“I’m ready,” he said impatiently. He grabbed the condoms, and he and Dean traded off rolling them onto each other. He ripped open another packet of lube and squeezed it into his hand, and spread it onto Dean’s cock by gripping it in his fist and stroking. Dean had been at half-mast while he was focusing on Castiel’s ass, but now he sprang back to life under Castiel’s warm, firm touch. “Don’t do anything to hurt yourself,” Cas said authoritatively. “I’ll do all the work.”

Castiel lined himself up and slowly sank down, spearing himself on Dean with a rough moan. His eyes slipped closed.

“Oh fuck,” Dean groaned back. “Oh, Jesus, you feel good.”

“You… mmmfffhhh,” Castiel spluttered. He rocked his hips carefully, never letting his weight rest on Dean too much. He lifted himself up a little then moved back down. “Oh fuck yes,” he said.

Dean reached out for Castiel’s dick and started stroking it and grinned happily at Castiel’s immediate moan of pleasure. “You still got a rule about me coming first?”

Castiel opened his eyes and gave Dean a blissful look. “Yes. Please. I want to see you.” He moved a little faster, squeezing and stroking Dean with the tight heat of him. He put his hands over Dean’s, clasping them against his dick but preventing him from stroking. “Does this feel good for you?” he asked, squeezing his muscles around Dean rhythmically as he lifted himself up and slid back down.

“It feels goddamn incredible. Holy shit.”

“Lie back and enjoy it, then,” Castiel said. He bent forward a little on his next thrust up and down, and suddenly cried out hoarsely. “Oh, god, there we go.”

Dean could move his hips a little without pain, so he started matching Castiel’s rocking, pushing himself in with a little more force and making sure he was hitting Castiel’s sweet spot. One of Castiel’s hands stroked over his face, brought his eyes up to him.

“Relax,” he said. “Just feel good. I want to see you, Dean. I want to see you come. Please.”

Dean did as he was told, just letting himself feel the pressure and slide of Castiel around him. Castiel had started wheezing and coughing a little, but it wasn’t slowing him down any. He braced a hand on Dean’s chest and slipped two fingers of his other hand into Dean’s mouth. Dean took them eagerly, lapping at them with his tongue. He loved having something, anything, in his mouth, and the heat in his groin grew and swelled. He sucked Castiel’s fingers in deep, panted around them, until the pressure grew unbearable and he let them slip out as he felt his balls draw up tight.

“Castiel!” he cried out as he came.

Castiel groaned and arched his back. “Ah, you feel so good, Dean, that feels so good.”

“Your turn, sweetheart,” Dean said, and started moving his hands on Castiel’s dick again. “You gonna come for me like this, or should I get you in my mouth?”

“Oh my god,” Castiel said fervently. “Your mouth is incredible, Dean, I haven’t forgotten.”

“Come here, then. Ride my face.”

“No,” Castiel panted. “Next time. Like this is good. I want to look at you.”

So Dean stroked him, his own cock going soft while still inside Castiel, and Castiel’s hands ran restlessly over Dean’s chest, breath coming faster and faster until he suddenly went rigid, groaned, and came, the heat of it spreading inside the condom in Dean’s hand. Dean kept stroking until Castiel’s hand came down to stop him.

“Enough,” he said, lifting off Dean’s cock and collapsing down next to him on the bed, resting an arm over Dean’s chest. “Fuck, I needed that.”

“You’re one to talk,” Dean scoffed. “I’ve barely even jacked off in four months.”

Castiel gaped at him. “Okay, you win.” Then he grimaced and pressed his forehead hard into Dean’s shoulder for a moment. “Ow. That was, perhaps, overly ambitious of me.”

“That was probably not great for your ribs.”

“Mmm. You know what, though? Worth it.”

Dean chuckled, and leaned over to kiss him. “I liked it.”

“Your leg is okay?”

“Can’t even feel it.” Dean started laughing. “I’m telling you, man, geriatric as fuck.”

Castiel chuckled weakly, then moaned and clutched at his side. “No, don’t make me laugh, I can’t.”

“All right. Just take a breather, I’ll clean up.”

They removed and tied off their condoms. Dean got up to dispose of them and brought a damp hand towel from the bathroom so they could wipe off. He was, in fact, feeling fantastic, and definitely didn’t need his crutches at the moment. Castiel wiggled up the bed and propped himself up on a couple of pillows. Dean went to put the towel back in the bathroom, and his stomach growled so loud Castiel heard it from over on the bed.

“We forgot about dinner,” Castiel said.

Dean’s eyes flicked to the alarm clock on the nightstand. “Holy cow. It’s only eight?”

“It feels so much later than that,” Castiel said.

“We could go out and pick up some fast food or something,” Dean suggested.

They looked at each other.

“Weed and Ho-Hos?” Castiel asked.

“Weed and Ho-Hos,” Dean agreed, giving him finger guns. “Hey, we’re gonna be in Dodge City tomorrow. I’ll get out my laptop and show you an old Errol Flynn movie about it.”

Castiel slowly dragged himself upright so he could put some clothes on. Dean watched him fish a little plastic baggie from his jacket pocket, walk into the bathroom, and flush it down the toilet. Neither of them said a word until he came back to Dean’s side.

“Movie sounds good. I kind of want to just pass out, but I’ll be pissed if I wake up at four a.m. Might as well try to stay awake for a couple more hours.”

So they went out to the parking lot to sit on the hood of the car and smoke, then went back to their room to curl up on the non-sex bed with a pillow nest that would keep them both comfortable. Dean threw his legs into Castiel’s lap to bug him for a massage while they watched Dodge City and ate snacks for dinner. They both fell asleep well before the movie ended.

Chapter Text

They had lost some time in Arizona and New Mexico, so they skipped the tourist traps during Tuesday’s drive to make up the difference. They listened to music, competed to see who could spot the most interesting license plate, and read some more of The Martian, only stopping long enough to smoke and stretch and piss every couple of hours.

The difference to the previous day was mainly that Castiel kept reaching over to lace their fingers together and rest their hands on the center console until one of them needed both their hands for something. They always drifted back together after a bit. And when they stopped for breaks, Castiel would crowd Dean up against the passenger side of the car and kiss him senseless before going off to smoke. At one abandoned stop, Castiel prevented Dean from even getting out of the car, knelt down in the dirt, and gave him a quick, intense hand job, claiming he couldn’t wait eight entire hours to touch him like this. Dean didn’t even attempt to protest, but he did throw his jacket over his lap in case anyone drove by.

They got to Dodge City too late in the day to be able to visit any museums, but Castiel found a karaoke bar where they spent their evening shooting pool, nursing beer, and singing—or rather, Dean sang and Castiel watched. Castiel also booked them a room in a truly epic cowboy-themed hotel, which was incredibly indulgent of him after already putting up with Dean’s chatter about Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday for nearly twenty-four hours straight. He even let Dean play Tombstone on the laptop while he face-fucked Dean to the soundtrack of gunfire and honky-tonk piano. It was a fantasy Dean hadn’t even realized he had until Castiel fulfilled it.

“Where have you been all my life?” Dean asked afterward, swiping saliva from his chin while Castiel threw out his condom.

Castiel snorted in amusement even as he was crawling back onto the bed to kiss him. “Please. I’ve seen your Instagram. You’ve dated a whole parade of beautiful people.”

Dean hummed against his lips. “Yeah. I don’t think you’ve exactly been hurting for companionship when you wanted it, either, buddy.”

“Mmm, true.”

“Castiel?” Dean asked, feeling his stomach twist in sudden fear that he was being too much. He was always too much. “‘M being serious. You’re… I know this is new, but…”

Castiel pulled his head back just enough to make eye contact comfortable. “I know. Me, too.”

“Okay,” Dean said in relief. “That’s good for now. We don’t need to talk about it yet.”

Castiel gave him a wry look, and pulled away to sit cross-legged on the bed next to him. “I wish. We have something serious to talk about.”

“We do?”

“I’m not sure what to expect tomorrow. Am I just dropping you on the sidewalk in front of your parents’ house and speeding away before they see me? I have to admit that I’d rather at least stay long enough to help you in, but I don’t want to be the cause of any arguments.”

Dean had been putting off thinking about this, and now that was coming back to bite him in the ass. He should know by now how he wanted to handle this.

“I didn’t tell them it was you who was bringing me,” he admitted. “You’re not wrong that it could start a fight, and I figured I’d rather have it in person, so I only have to have it once, after the deed is already done.”

Castiel was tapping on his legs. Dean reached out and grabbed his hands.

“I think it would be kinda nice if you stuck around to introduce yourself at least. We can play it by ear. They’re gonna be suspicious at first, but they’ll come around.”

“At the risk of sounding like an asshole, I don’t really care if they like me, Dean. I just want you to be okay.”

Dean tipped his head back against the wall and stared up at the ceiling. “I’ll be fine.”

“You don’t sound sure.”

“I mean, I’m sure we’ll argue because we can’t help it. But my family ain’t like yours, Cas. Nobody’s going to hurt anything except my feelings.”

Castiel scowled at him, although a tiny bit of the tension went out of his shoulders. “I don’t want that to happen to you, either.”

Dean sighed, having no other answer.

“I could stay,” Castiel said quietly.

Dean tilted his head back down to look at him. “What do you mean?”

“I appreciate that we aren’t really looking to put a label on this,” Castiel said, gesturing between them. “But you could tell them I’m your boyfriend. Tell them I’m here for the holidays with you. Let me stay with you and support you.”

“You don’t need to put up with their shit,” Dean argued. “You don’t want that.”

“I want to be with you,” Castiel said stubbornly.

Dean thought about it for a couple of minutes, listening to the tinny sound of the movie still playing on his laptop in the background. Castiel waited with an impressive poker face on. He could keep Castiel from having to deal with his family’s bullshit, but only by relegating him to a hotel room alone for a couple of days. It had seemed like a reasonable plan before they’d started this drive. Before Dean realized that he never seemed to get tired of Castiel’s company, before they’d admitted to wanting each other and doing something about it. Now it felt kind of shitty to park him out of the way while Dean endured turkey and football and passive-aggressive comments and had to pretend like he didn’t wish he was with Castiel instead.

“Okay,” Dean said.

“Okay?”

“It’d be nice to have you around,” Dean said. “I’d like that.”

Castiel broke into a smile, and then settled down to give Dean a very pleasant reward for his decision-making skills.

They pulled up in front of the Winchester family home around one in the afternoon on the day before Thanksgiving. Dean looked up at the familiar white siding and porch columns, and felt something in him crawling into a hole to hibernate. Castiel turned off the car and turned to look at Dean.

“We can always just grab the keys for your car and make a run for it. Whenever you want, just say the word.”

He wasn’t even remotely joking, as far as Dean could tell. So Dean blew out the breath he’d been holding, and leaned over to kiss him.

“Nah, it’s gonna be fine. Come on.”

Dean directed Castiel to just leave their stuff in the car for now, just in case things went worse than he hoped. Dean didn’t take his crutches, either, figuring he wouldn’t need them anyway and feeling like he needed to look as normal as possible for the first few minutes at least. He didn’t really like the fact that the last time his family had seen him, he’d been in the hospital. They came to the two little steps up onto the porch, and Cas tried to put an arm around his waist to steady him, but Dean shuffled away from his touch.

“Cas, um,” he said. “This is kinda stupid, but. My family knows I’m bi, but they’re not totally comfortable with it. And they won’t be hateful toward you, but it’s better if we don’t… you know.”

“Don’t what?”

“Just… limit the PDA.”

“I assume by that you mean limit it to zero and act like ‘boyfriend’ is some abstract concept that doesn’t include the sinful dirtiness of helping you with the stairs.”

Dean winced and looked away.

“Why would you accommodate them like that?” Castiel asked, scowling.

Dean stiffened. “Pot. Kettle. Do you really want to have this fight, again, right here?”

Castiel sighed. “Fine. I understand. They’re your family, so you get to call the shots, but for the record: I hate it.”

Dean scrubbed a hand over his face and hair and finally knocked on the door, three good hard raps, then tested the knob. As suspected, it wasn’t locked, and he was able to let them inside. He did have a key, but his parents always liked to brag about Lawrence being the kind of town where you didn’t have to lock your doors. Not like that cesspool, L.A., was the part they usually didn’t say out loud.

The record player was on, spinning a Joni Mitchell vinyl, which meant Mary was home at the very least.

“Mom, I’m home!” he called out.

“In the kitchen, baby!” his mom’s voice called back.

“Who let you in the kitchen?” he couldn’t help but joke, even though his heart was picking up speed with his nerves. He could see Castiel tapping restlessly at his leg again. He’d said he didn’t care and wasn’t nervous, but he’d also put on a nice pair of pants and a buttoned-up office shirt for this.

“Ha, ha,” Mary said dryly. “I’m not going to win a Michelin star, but slicing apples isn’t rocket science.”

Dean sucked in a breath, and put his game face on as they stepped into the kitchen. Mary was in fact, slicing apples, and reached out immediately to get her arms around him with her hands all sticky from apple juice. Dean didn’t care, just took the too-tight hug and gave it right back. “Hi, Mom.”

“Hi, baby.”

He stepped back, and drew Castiel forward to stand next to him. “Mom, this is Castiel Shurley, the only son of a bitch crazy enough to drive me all the way out here.” He used Castiel’s full name so his mother would realize who Castiel was.

“Oh,” she said, looking up in surprise. “Nice to meet you, Castiel.” She reached out to give him an apple-sticky handshake.

Castiel accepted it without a qualm. “It’s nice to meet you as well, Mrs. Winchester. You can call me Cas; most people do.”

Well, this was going a hell of a lot better than Dean had expected. But then Mary’s eyes went narrow, and she squinted up at Castiel with flint in her eyes.

“I know you.”

Castiel ducked his head submissively. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Your cousin is the one who hurt Dean.”

“Yes. I’m so sorry, ma’am.”

“And Cas is the one who told the truth about what happened and made sure his cousin went to jail,” Dean broke in. “Not to mention the one who sat in a car with me keeping pressure on my leg until the ambulance got there that night. And the one who came to the hospital to check on me even though he had a concussion himself.”

“And the one who showed up to his cousin’s bail hearing so drugged up he could barely stay awake,” Mary said sourly. Dean hadn’t been there, since he’d been in the hospital with his leg in traction, but he couldn’t say he was surprised to hear it.

Castiel gave her a very wry smile. “It wasn’t my finest moment. In my defense, I had a concussion and was at my cousin’s bail hearing.”

Mary’s mouth twitched, which meant she found Castiel’s acerbicism funny but was trying not to show it, and Dean leapt on it.

“Mom, please give him a chance. He brought me here, didn’t he? I don’t want to just kick him out to spend Thanksgiving by himself while he’s waiting to drive me back on Friday.”

Mary crossed her arms and thought hard for a moment. “For you, baby,” she said, “yes, I’ll give him a chance.”

Dean came up behind her and wrapped her in a hug, kissing the top of her head when it tipped back at him. “Thank you, Mom. You’re the best.”

“All right, enough,” she said, swatting at him.

“Thank you, Mrs. Winchester,” Castiel said, still in his meek persona.

“None of that, you can call me Mary.”

“Thank you, Mary,” Castiel said, and gave her one of his real smiles, the kind that knocked Dean’s socks off. Mary was clearly not immune, because she softened up a lot from there.

“Where’s Sam and Dad, anyway?” Dean asked.

“Your father’s working today,” Mary said, rolling her eyes. “You know how he is. Sam got here yesterday, but he went to meet up with a couple of old school friends. They’ll both be home for supper.”

“Cool,” Dean said. Castiel was looking at him, waiting for him to say the rest of what he was supposed to say. Dean fidgeted. Mary frowned at them.

Why don’t you boys go ahead and bring your things inside and wash up, so you can help me get ready for tomorrow.”

“I can do that,” Castiel said immediately, putting a hand to Dean’s shoulder to stop him from moving, but drawing back quickly. He was already reaching into his pocket for his pack of cigarettes. “You stay here with your mom.”

Traitor. He was a traitor.

As soon as Castiel was out of the room, Mary raised her eyebrows high.

“So?”

Dean scrubbed a hand over the back of his neck. “So. Um. Cas is. He.”

“He’s your boyfriend,” Mary said.

Dean looked at the pile of apples she was slicing up. The slices were all uneven, some too thick and some too thin, and he really loved his mom so much, but she was so bad at this. He immediately went to the sink to wash his hands and take over.

“Yeah. He is.”

“And you invited him to stay with us for Thanksgiving without even giving us a heads-up?”

Dean dried his hands on a frayed dish towel that was probably as old as the vinyl record playing in the living room and sighed.

“Better to ask forgiveness than permission?” he said.

“Oh, baby,” Mary said, and wrapped her arms around him as he turned around. “Forgiveness? For what?”

“I know you guys don’t—” Dean said, and the rest of it got stuck in his throat. He buried his face into her shoulder, let her hold him.

“Moms worry,” Mary said. “And I guess I’ve never been quiet about how much I want grandbabies. But Dean, you know I love you. You can’t help who you are.”

Dean felt disappointment trying to crawl up his throat and come out of his mouth, but he swallowed it down. “Love you, too, Mom.”

She let him go when he moved, and he immediately started in on the apples. Castiel appeared in the doorway with both bags slung over one shoulder and Dean’s crutches in his hand just as Mary reached out to ruffle Dean’s hair.

“Where should I put the bags?”

“Upstairs,” Mary answered, but she was eyeing the crutches. “Dean, I thought you said you’ve been healing up well.”

“I have,” Dean said, even as Castiel was leaning the crutches in a corner of the kitchen. “I have those just in case, but I get around all right.”

Castiel’s face was carefully, perfectly blank.

“I guess we’re in my old room, huh?” Dean asked his mom. He hadn’t been thinking about where they’d sleep, but it made sense. All the bedrooms were upstairs. Downstairs only had the kitchen, living room, laundry room, and a bathroom. “That’s fine. Mom, can you show Cas where it is while I get these pies going? And please tell me you got the turkey thawing.”

“You texted me about it three times on Monday, Dean, of course I did.”

Castiel kept looking at Dean until Mary led him away, his eyes narrowed but saying nothing. Dean kept working in the kitchen while straining his ears to hear what Castiel and Mary might say to each other. Thankfully, the conversation seemed very focused on practicalities like which bedroom they were in, and the fact that the hot water knob in the bathroom sink wasn’t working. He made a mental note.

They came back quickly, and Dean assigned Castiel to finish the apples and Mary to make the pumpkin pie filling while he started prepping the crusts. He took inventory of the fridge and cupboards, making sure all the ingredients were there for tomorrow’s feast.

“Anybody else coming?” he asked his mother. “And if so, what are they bringing?”

“All the cousins are going to my parents’ this year,” Mary said. “So it’ll just be us, and we invited Cassie Robinson.”

Dean froze in the middle of getting out the butter and gave his mother a sharp look. “Mom.”

“Her parents retired down to Florida earlier this year and we wanted to make sure she wasn’t alone for the holidays,” Mary said, grating nutmeg over a bowl of pumpkin pie filling and not looking up at him.

Castiel had been very quiet, but Dean heard his fingers tapping on the counter and looked over at him to find him watching the conversation with quiet intensity, his ice-water bowl already full of neat slices of apple.

“Well, good, somebody will eat the apple pie with me,” Dean said.

“We should ask Cas what kind of pie he likes, as well,” Mary said. “We can always make another flavor while we’re at it. What do you usually eat at Thanksgiving?”

Castiel was clearly debating how to answer that, and Dean got a sinking feeling that he wasn’t going to like the answer.

“My family doesn’t usually celebrate Thanksgiving,” he said. “But I’m sure I’ll like whatever you make.”

Yeah, that figured.

“They don’t do holidays?” Mary asked, eyebrows high.

“Usually just Christmas. We all go to our house in Big Bear and go skiing.”

Dean knew enough about California to know that Castiel’s family had probably paid well over a million dollars for that house, and enough about Castiel’s family to know that putting them all in it together for longer than an hour was probably a miserable experience. There were a hundred terrible memories about shitty Christmases spent there swimming in Castiel’s eyes, and he was clearly jonesing for another smoke so bad that Dean almost wanted one himself.

“That sounds lovely,” Mary said, because she didn’t know anything about Big Bear and not enough about Castiel. “I’ve never been skiing, is it fun?”

Something about Mary’s sincerity in asking made Castiel smile, and he relaxed a little. So he started telling her about what he liked about it, and Dean was listening, but he was also watching Castiel’s eyes lose that haunted look, and the way he moved his hands when he talked.

They spent a happy hour getting pies made and into the oven, then Sam came in. He remembered Castiel right away and seemed more inclined to politeness than Mary had been. His complete lack of surprise when Mary said Castiel was Dean’s boyfriend was almost insulting, since he’d only seen them together for ten minutes months ago, but Dean wasn’t going to argue if it meant everybody was getting along.

They all settled down at the kitchen table with a round of beer to chat a little. Sam told Castiel about veterinary school, Castiel told them all about an interesting contested inheritance case he’d taken the lead on last month, and then somehow, before Dean could figure out a way to stop it, Castiel had dragged out his laptop and was researching Kansas property laws to answer Mary’s question about her dispute with the homeowner’s association.

Dean excused himself to check out the faulty knob on the sink upstairs. Castiel clearly didn’t really hear him, too wrapped up in his research. Dean got up the first two steps before Castiel was suddenly right behind him.

“Dean, let me help you.”

“I got this,” Dean said, waving him off.

“You’re a pig-headed bastard,” Castiel said.

“At the risk of repeating myself: pot, kettle.”

“I’m right behind you,” Castiel said, mounting the first stair as Dean took the third. “Just in case.”

“Yeah, knock yourself out,” Dean grumbled, and got up the fourth step.

A good minute later, they’d made it to the second floor, and Dean turned to Castiel with a smirk. “See? I got this. Now, you think I can look at the damn sink without supervision, or you wanna keep babysitting me?”

Castiel threw his hands in the air in silent exasperation and went back downstairs.

When Dean came down a few minutes later and headed for the garage to see if John had the part he needed, Mary followed him, sipping her beer and watching him rummage in the tool closet.

“I get it now,” she said.

“What are you talking about?”

“The way he jumped up from the table and took off running to make sure you were okay on the stairs,” she said, smiling.

“Oh my god, you should have seen him freak out when I scraped my hand a couple days ago,” Dean said, holding up his hand to show her the little bandage.

“Have you asked him for the moon yet?” she asked, and Dean groaned and blushed. “What? You think he wouldn’t build a rocket and give it his best shot?”

“Mom,” Dean said, looking up at her helplessly. “I think maybe I…” He couldn’t finish that sentence, and wasn’t sure he wanted to.

“Well, first he has to survive the rest of Thanksgiving,” she said.

Dean’s hand landed on the box that held the faucet cartridge he was looking for, and he turned to the toolbox to grab a screwdriver and wrench. “Not even sure I’m gonna survive the rest of Thanksgiving,” he said. “Cassie? Are you serious?”

Mary didn’t look the least bit ashamed of herself. “Her parents really did go down to Florida. I didn’t think there was any harm in at least talking to her.”

“Well, I disagree, but it’s too late now,” Dean said. “Did you even tell her I was going to be here?”

“I did,” Mary said.

“Surprised she agreed to come, in that case. You better warn her I brought someone.”

“Why would I do that? It doesn’t matter, right?”

Dean slammed the toolbox shut, making Mary jump a little. “I’m gonna go fix the sink. Tell Cassie whatever you want.”

Mary must have texted John about what was going on, because when he got home, he wasn’t surprised to see a stranger setting the table for supper. He shook Castiel’s hand too firmly, and Dean saw Castiel’s metaphorical hackles immediately go up.

John greeted Mary with a kiss and started washing his hands. “What’s for supper?”

“Just spaghetti and salad. Wanted to save our appetites and energy for the big day tomorrow.”

“Guessin’ Dean helped you out in the kitchen, since nothing’s burned,” he teased her, smacking her on the butt as she passed him by.

“Cas did, actually,” Dean said. “I was upstairs fixing that hot water cartridge in the bathroom.”

John grabbed a beer for himself and sat down at the head of the table while Castiel was just finishing up putting the silverware down and Sam came in behind him with a salad bowl.

“I was going to get to that,” he said to Dean.

Dean hadn’t expected a thank you, he reminded himself. “Well, now you can cross it off your list. How’re things at the garage?” he asked as he sat down in the seat he considered ‘his’ from countless family dinners in the past.

“Would be a damn sight better if I could find a reliable assistant,” John groused. “My last one ran off to work in Kansas City a month back.”

“That sucks.”

“Well, could be worse,” he said, and waited for Dean to give him an encouraging look. “Could have run off to Los Angeles,” John said, then guffawed and slapped his hand down on the table.

Dean just rolled his eyes, then saw Castiel standing just behind his shoulder in full Transformer mode. Shoulders stiff, eyes stormy. Dean nudged at the chair next to his.

“Sit down, Cas.”

Castiel did, and somehow, the first few minutes of dinner went okay with talk of old friends in town and Sam’s first couple of months in his vet program. But then the topic of Dean’s work came up, and he told them a little about the current difficulty with finding good work, and his most recent role.

“Well, that’s nonsense,” John said. “I saw your last movie, the one that came out right before Christmas. The war one. What was it called?”

“Ninety One Whiskey,” Dean said, just as Cas said, “That wasn’t his last movie.”

“What was that, son?” John asked, addressing Cas.

“Nothing,” Dean answered for Cas, stomping on his foot underneath the table. Castiel was right; Dean had small roles in two films released more recently than his also-minor role in the war epic in which he’d tragically gotten blown up and given the actual lead actor the impetus to gather his courage and rally his men. But it didn’t matter enough to argue back.

“Well, it was damn good,” John said. “You ought to be getting plenty of stuff like that.”

Sam cleared his throat. “It was a really good movie, actually,” he said, “and Dean, I know you didn’t get much screen time in that one, but it left a really big impression. I read this piece in Entertainment Weekly where they were furious that you didn’t get a nomination for Best Supporting Actor.”

“Aw, I didn’t even deserve it,” Dean said. “That movie was pure Oscar bait anyway.”

“Mary, what did you think?” Castiel asked.

Mary looked down at her spaghetti guiltily. “I-I didn’t watch that one. I didn’t want to watch my son dying, not even in a movie,” she said. “Sorry, baby, but you understand, right?”

“Sure,” Dean said, chugging his glass of water to force down the spaghetti that felt like it was stuck in his throat.

“But you saw Under the Midnight Sun, right?” Castiel asked. “He was an ecological research scientist in that one.”

Dean turned to stare at him. “I didn’t even know you saw that.”

Castiel shrugged unapologetically, his eyes on Mary.

“We didn’t get around to that one yet,” Mary answered, making it clear neither she nor John had seen it. And that was… well, it was fine. It wasn’t like Dean wasn’t aware that his parents didn’t approve of or care about his acting career. He didn’t need them to see every single damn movie he made. He was getting the impression Mary might not have seen any of them, actually, and John might have just seen the one.

“Dean is incredibly talented,” Castiel said, his jaw tight. “It’s a shame that none of you seem to know that.”

Dean forgot himself, and reached out to take Castiel’s hand and squeeze it, a silent plea for him to play nice. Castiel squeezed it back.

“I apologize,” Castiel said with a faint smile. “I’ve done a lot of driving the last few days and I’m worn out.”

“That’s okay,” Mary said, just as John said, “Dean, I’ve told you to keep that kind of stuff to yourself.”

Dean pulled his hand back into his lap.

Castiel wiped his mouth with a napkin and stood up. “Please excuse me,” he said, picking up his still half-full plate. “I’ve just remembered that I left something in the car.”

“Sensitive type, isn’t he?” John asked as Castiel closed the front door. Dean could just barely see the faint red glow of the tip of Castiel’s cigarette lighting up in the dark outside the front window.

Sam went into a coughing fit and reached for his water glass.

Dean stood up with his own mostly-empty plate. “May I be excused as well?” he asked. He limped to the kitchen sink to set it down, and took a few deep, calming breaths.

“Can you boys finish up the dishes?” Mary asked, standing up abruptly. “John, can I see you upstairs, please?”

And John, loud and broad and opinionated John Winchester, who was smirking like he’d said something funny, dropped his smile and curved his shoulders down and followed his wife up the stairs like a kicked dog.

Dean started rinsing dishes to put into the dishwasher while Sam silently scraped leftovers into an empty Cool Whip tub, which Mary always laughingly referred to as ‘redneck Tupperware.’ There was a burst of raised voices from the closed bedroom door at the top of the stairs, too muffled to make out anything they said.

“Dean,” Sam said, bringing over the emptied serving dish. “You know Dad tries. You remember how shitty Grandma Millie raised him about this kind of stuff.”

“We don’t need to talk about it,” Dean said.

Sam took a breath and licked his lips like he was going to talk anyway. Twice. But he didn’t say anything, and he turned away to play fridge Tetris to try to fit the leftovers in with all their ingredients for the big dinner tomorrow.

Castiel came back inside carrying a bag of leftover trash from the car, his face drawn and tight.

“Sam, get lost,” Dean said.

Sam grabbed a beer, scurried to the living room, and flicked the TV on, turning it up way louder than it needed to be.

“Hey,” Dean said, grabbing Castiel by the waist and pressing in close. Just while they had a second, to let just the tiniest bit of pressure off the valve. “Talk to me.”

“How do you stand this?” Castiel murmured, hands sliding around Dean’s back.

“They’re my family,” Dean said. “We don’t always like each other, but we love each other. But I guess now you know why I moved 1,500 miles away.”

“How can you breathe around this much passive-aggressiveness?”

The sound of stomping footsteps came from upstairs, and Dean snorted.

“Not always that passive,” he said. “I’m just… too much, for them. Too loud, too gay, too weird. They wanted me to work for my dad and marry Cassie or Jo and never leave Lawrence. They never knew what to do with the kid they got, instead of the kid they wanted. Sam’s more their speed. Sure, he’s a brainiac who wants to study veterinary medicine, but he’s gonna stay in Kansas and settle down with some nice girl. But me, I always gotta make a song and dance out of everything.”

Castiel cupped Dean’s jaw with his hand, pressed their foreheads together. “I like you so much, Dean,” he murmured. “You’re a wonderful dancer.” He laughed, wild and without humor. “God, Gabe was right. He was right the whole time.”

“Why the hell are we thinking about Gabe?”

“They’re gonna hate us anyway, that’s what he used to say. We’ll never be good enough, so we might as well give them a reason. He thought I was stupid for trying to play their game.”

“My parents don’t hate me.”

“They’d have to know you to hate you,” Castiel said, and flinched badly when there was another round of stomping footsteps upstairs. “I picked a hell of a time to try to sober up.”

Dean’s stomach cramped, and he bit his tongue. Castiel saw it and didn’t let him get away with it.

“Just say it, whatever it is.”

“Cas, if you can’t… if you can’t do this, it’s okay. If you need to go get a hotel and—and do whatever you gotta do, that’s—I’d understand, that’s all.”

“You can say ‘drugs,’ Dean,” Castiel said with a sardonic smile. “I’ve been flirting with a ketamine addiction for a few months now, and you know that, and I know that you know that. Just ask if I need to go do drugs.”

“Yeah.” It punched its way out of Dean’s chest and throat without his permission. He’d known what he was getting into, with Castiel, and he didn’t have any right to be upset or disappointed if Castiel’s issues got in the way of what he was trying to do for Dean. “Yeah, I guess so.”

They were already pressed so close together, but Castiel somehow removed a bare inch that Dean hadn’t known was between them, cuddled up even closer.

“I’m not going to leave you here,” he said softly.

“It’s just my family. I can deal with them. You don’t have to.”

Castiel’s hands were clutched so hard into the back of Dean’s shirt that they were shaking. “I want to be with you,” he said, just like he’d said at the hotel room in Dodge City the night before.

“Okay,” Dean said. He angled his face and kissed him. “You can stop trying to hide the fact that you’re smoking, though. Just step outside whenever you need to. Hell, invite my mom, I know she sneaks a cigarette once in a while when my dad’s at work, and he just pretends he doesn’t notice.”

Castiel laughed, that rough and smoky kind that made Dean weak in the knees. “Okay.”

Footsteps on the stairs had them backpedaling away from each other, and Dean tried to pretend he’d been loading the dishwasher instead of holding Castiel so hard they’d practically merged into one being. John shook his head at them.

“There’s a reason I call your mother my better half, Dean.”

“Because she’s awesome?” Dean suggested while fishing under the sink for dishwasher soap.

“That she is,” John said with a smile. “And hot.”

“Great, Dad, I really want to talk about how hot my mom is,” Dean said.

John’s face turned more serious. “You boys don’t need to try to tiptoe around anything, all right?”

“What does that mean?” Dean asked, noting that Castiel was standing very still and quiet right in between John and Dean.

“Mary helped me realize that it’s damn stupid of me to ask you not to hold hands at the dinner table when you’re sleeping in the same bed right down the hall,” John said with a shrug. “We’re all adults here, and it’s fine. Just… don’t get crazy, all right? I’m still getting used to all this.”

Dean stared at John, who was still just as broad and loud and opinionated as he’d been fifteen minutes ago, saying something Dean couldn’t even parse out because it was so unexpectedly nice.

John cleared his throat, and walked around them to get to the fridge and get a beer. Castiel pivoted slowly the whole time, keeping John in his sight and keeping himself in front of Dean. Dean wasn’t even sure if Castiel knew he was doing it.

“Anyway,” John said gruffly. “When you’ve finished up the dishes, come on in and sit with us. Jeopardy’s on in a minute, and I know you love kicking my ass at Jeopardy.”

He left, and Castiel relaxed again, and Dean shoved him a little on his way to the fridge to grab beers for himself and Mary. He held one up to Castiel with his eyebrows raised.

“No, um—that would be a bad idea right now,” Castiel said.

“Okay,” Dean said simply, and put the beer back to grab them two cans of Coke. “Go smoke and then come get your ass kicked at Jeopardy.”

“How do you know I won’t be doing the ass-kicking?”

“Come find out,” Dean said.

Castiel was amused to find out that they actually kept score to see which of them was ‘winning,’ Sam scribbling tally marks on a notepad. He was less amused at how badly he ‘lost,’ but that was what he got for being remarkably uninterested in pop culture—apart from movies Dean had been in, apparently. When he’d found time to watch them all in the short time they’d known each other, Dean didn’t know.

Castiel fidgeted a lot, as Jeopardy turned into some show about cowboys that John and Mary liked and then into the evening news, as John’s head tipped back in his armchair to snore softly and Sam and Dean played the game of seeing how close they could get to stealing the remote before John snorted and picked his head up to glare at them and say, “I’m watching that.” Mary pulled out Scrabble and they regretted it when they realized they’d found the game that Castiel kicked ass at. Whenever his fidgeting got too bad, Castiel would go outside, smoke, and come back in once the edge was taken off just enough to get through another thirty minutes.

Eventually, still early, Dean realized he was exhausted and aching, and he had set off a round of yawning amongst his family for the third time in ten minutes.

“Think I’m gonna go to bed,” he said, standing up carefully. His family had seen him limping, obviously, but he’d been taking it easy and they hadn’t seen how bad it could get sometimes. Dean didn’t want them to see it. They already found him wanting in so many ways. But Castiel was standing up with him, hand already out in case Dean stumbled on his pins-and-needles foot. “G’night.”

Mary got up, too, to kiss him on the cheek, and then turned and kissed Castiel on the cheek, too. “Night, boys,” she said, as if it was a given that Castiel was going with him. Like they were that kind of domestic.

Dean approached the stairs with trepidation, this time. He was tired, and he’d already done the stairs twice today, and he could hear his rehab therapist yelling at him about doing too much with his knee.

“Dean,” Castiel said, close behind him.

And Dean thought, hell with it, maybe Gabe fucking Milton was right about at least this one thing. “Yeah, okay,” he said, and let Castiel pick him up and carry him up the stairs. He could feel his family’s eyes on them, but he didn’t look back at them. Just looked up into Castiel’s face.

Castiel set him down at the top and took two steps to be out of sight of everyone, and collapsed against the wall, pressing his hand to his bruised ribs. “Fuck,” he gasped.

“Okay, so we’re both idiots,” Dean said, and Castiel let out a pained, wheezing laugh. “Come on, champ, let’s go to bed.”

They cleaned up in the bathroom, and Castiel helped Dean rub cream into his scars and do his stretches, not being at all precious about it, just acting like it was as normal a part of the bedtime routine as brushing their teeth. They cuddled up close in Dean’s childhood bedroom, which looked exactly as he’d left it—walls covered in movie and concert posters, shelves crowded with books and trinkets, sports trophies, and the stupid little trophies the drama department at school had given to the theater nerds so they could feel equal to the sports kids—and they fell asleep clinging to each other like Dean’s too-small bed was a life raft and they’d fall into the ocean if they didn’t hold on tight enough.

The morning was too busy for any of the previous day’s awkwardness to get in edgewise. There were vegetables to peel and chop, bread dough to knead and proof, and a turkey to stuff. Castiel wasn’t bad in the kitchen, and neither was Sam, so the three of them did most of it while Mary cleaned up the house and John went… somewhere.

Cassie was bringing the cranberry sauce and some wine, reportedly, so there was a lot for them to do. Castiel did whatever Dean or Sam asked him to do, eyes wide and disbelieving and asking repeatedly if they were sure this was the right amount of food for six people.

“Okay, Thanksgiving virgin,” Dean said, waving a wooden spoon coated in buttery bread crumbs at him. “Why don’t you let me worry about that?”

“You do not have to phrase it that way,” Castiel muttered, and Sam was snorting helplessly over the mound of potatoes he was peeling and chopping.

“I really think maybe I do,” Dean laughed. “It’s the only virginal thing about you, so—”

“No!” Sam said, throwing a piece of potato at him. “No! You’re my brother, you cannot talk about your sex life in front of me!”

“Why, does it make you jealous because you can’t get any?” Dean snickered.

Sam drew himself up, and reminded Dean that his brother was, in fact, tall and broad and handsome, even if he was a total nerd. “Please. I get plenty.”

“Nobody special, though?” Dean asked more sincerely.

“I mean, undergrad isn’t exactly the place to look for a serious life partner. I just started the vet program a couple of months ago,” Sam said. “And there is this really cute girl, but she won’t talk to me, she thinks I’m spoiled or something.”

“Well, you are,” Dean pointed out, and ducked a second flying potato chunk. “Knock that off, we’re supposed to eat those!”

“What’s her name?” Castiel asked while he continued kneading bread dough and distracting Dean with the cords of muscle flexing in his forearms.

“Amelia,” Sam sighed. “She’s kind of mean to me, but… I like her.”

“Okay, Sammy,” Dean snorted. “I didn’t know you were the step-on-me-Mommy type, but you do you.”

“Dean!” Sam shouted, completely aghast, going bright red and throwing the vegetable peeler at him while Dean ducked and laughed so hard it made his chest hurt.

When someone knocked on the door, Dean limped hurriedly to be the one to answer it. He could hear the vacuum going upstairs, and wanted to get there before his mom realized Cassie was here. He wanted a second with Cassie to let her know what was going on before she got blindsided by it. He didn’t know what his mom was thinking, because Cassie wouldn’t hesitate to just walk out the door if she didn’t like the situation.

He opened it, already saying “Hey,” before trailing off when he realized it wasn’t just Cassie. Jo Harvelle was standing there, too, with a shopping bag dangling from one arm and the other arm around Cassie’s waist.

“Hey,” he said again, and tried for a smile. “Jo, I didn’t know you were coming.”

“I invited her,” Cassie said.

“That’s cool,” Dean said, trying to sound like he meant it. Like he was fine with both of his Kansas exes showing up for Thanksgiving together, as if they were besties now, as if they hadn’t nearly scratched each other’s eyes out about five years ago. “Come on in.”

“Dean, I have to warn you,” Cassie whispered as they stepped in. “I think your mom is having some thoughts about you and me.”

“Oh, I figured,” he said. “So you brought Jo for backup. Smart thinking. Good to see you both.”

“I brought Jo because she’s my girlfriend,” Cassie said.

Dean blinked, and wondered if he was having auditory hallucinations. “I don’t think I heard you right.”

“Yes, you did,” Jo said, stepping forward a little aggressively. “Cassie and I are an item. Is that an issue?”

“No issue,” Dean said weakly. “I just thought you hated each other.”

“You thought we were going to let a dumb boy who couldn’t even be bothered to stick around come between us our whole lives?” Jo asked, rolling her eyes.

Dean flinched. They were giving him matched challenging looks, the woman who had been there when he’d first fallen in love with movies in Bobby Singer’s theater, and the woman who had been the first person he’d told that he actually wanted to be in the movies he loved so much. Neither of them had been understanding or willing to stick by him when they realized he was serious. But apparently they were willing to stick by each other, so that was… great. That was fantastic.

Dean felt a very welcome arm slide around his waist, and he found himself being tucked neatly into Castiel’s side.

“Hi,” he said gratefully.

Castiel, the person who did actually seem to believe in his acting career, maybe more than Dean did these days, squeezed him possessively.

“Um, so,” Dean said nervously. “This is Jo, and, um. Jesus. This is Cassie. Guys, this is my boyfriend, Cas…”

“You’re fucking joking,” Jo said. “His name is Cas?”

Castiel, thank God, seemed to think it was funny. “So you don’t have a type, you just have a thing for people who can be Neal Cassady for you?” he laughed.

“I do not— fuck all of you, actually.”

“I mean…” Cassie said, brow furrowed as if deep in thought. “Yes, you have.”

Castiel, Jo, and Cassie all started cracking up, and Dean shoved his boyfriend away from him. “I hate you guys.”

Castiel finally reached out a hand to shake. “I’m Castiel, nice to meet you. My cousins all call me Cassie, so feel free to.”

Cassie smiled at him. “Should we sit together at dinner and make Dean more uncomfortable than he’s ever been in his life?”

“Jo,” Dean said desperately. “Don’t let this happen. Control your girlfriend.”

“Are you being misogynistic, Dean Winchester?” Cassie asked, pinching his arm.

“No?”

“Good,” Jo said, “now get out of the way and let me get to the kitchen to put this bag down before my arm falls off.”

Dean gestured an elaborate bow at her and extended his hand toward the kitchen door, and both women swept past to head in and exchange greetings with Sam.

“This is going to be fun,” Castiel said, returning to Dean’s side with his eyes sparkling with laughter.

“This is going to be torture,” Dean corrected, letting Castiel tug him outside to the front porch to watch him smoke before going in to join the others.

Dean watched the play of Castiel’s fingers and lips and wished he didn’t think smoking was kind of sexy. He followed the little plume of smoke billowing from between rounded, pink lips and wished he was willing to fuck Castiel in his parents’ house, because he wanted him so badly, and having to wait until tomorrow when they were back on the road was the worst.

A couple of minutes later, just as they were about to head back inside, the growl of a car engine cut through the quiet of their residential neighborhood. Dean perked up instantly because he knew that roar like the back of his own hand.

“Dean?” Castiel asked cautiously, seeing the way Dean went alert.

“That’s my Baby,” he said, craning his neck around to see the black nose of her turning onto their street, John at the wheel. “Didn’t realize Dad had gone to pick her up. He must have walked all the way over to the shop.”

John pulled up to the curb right behind their rented little Toyota Camry, put it in neutral, and pressed down on the gas to make her purr.

“Here she is!” he said, getting out and slapping her roof, leaving the engine idling. “Looking as good as the day she came off the lot!”

“She looks awesome, Dad,” Dean said, limping down the driveway and putting a shaky hand to the passenger door. A few months ago, this door had been destroyed, half-buried in his leg and his face. Now its smooth black gleam caught the tiny bit of daylight through the November clouds. “You fixed her up real nice. Hey, Baby.”

“You want to take her for a quick spin before we eat?” John asked, gesturing at the open driver’s side door.

Dean looked away, down the street. For a minute, he thought about the other life he could have had, if he’d stayed here, head buried in her engine with John at his side, until he learned enough to do such extensive repair work himself. He probably would have wound up hating this car, he thought, his stomach clenched around all the criticism he’d swallowed as a teenager that still sometimes sat heavily in his gut.

“I can’t,” he said. Too quiet. John didn’t even hear him.

“What was that?”

He took a deep breath. Looked back at John, saw Castiel from the corner of his eye take a single, uncertain step off the porch.

“I can’t drive her yet,” Dean said. “I’m still having some issues with my foot.”

John blinked at him, then reached into the car to shut her off. He stood up with the keys in his hand and closed the door.

“I didn’t know that. That why you got the crutches hanging around in the kitchen?”

Dean licked his lips. “I still need ‘em sometimes, if I gotta walk for a while.”

John came around the back of the car, his face fixed in a frown. “How were you figuring to get her back to California, exactly, Dean?”

“Cas is gonna drive her,” he said, jerking his thumb toward where Castiel had moved another couple of steps closer.

“Like hell he is,” John said immediately, clutching the keys even harder out of reflex.

“Why shouldn’t he?” Dean asked, feeling the breath leave him, like his chest was being wrapped tight by a constricting snake.

“She’s a special lady, not everybody knows how to treat her.”

“She’s mine,” Dean said. “You gave her to me. That means I get to decide who drives her.”

“I didn’t give her to you so you could let some…” John trailed off, mouth tightening with what have been a hint of regret. Too late, if so, because Dean’s pulse was already pounding in his ears.

“Some what, Dad?”

“Just expected you to take care of her.”

Dean looked at his father. His big, blunt father, with his big hands and big shoulders. He’d somehow not realized until just now that he was looking John directly in the eyes. Dean was tall and broad, too. And he didn’t live here. He lived in Los Angeles, where nobody batted an eye if he wanted to kiss a man, not on the street or in his house. Castiel was here so Dean wouldn’t have to feel alone in this misery, but this wasn’t right. He shouldn’t have to put up with being talked about like this, just for Dean’s sake. He was… he was Dean’s boyfriend. And Dean wasn’t going to let anyone say shit about his boyfriend. Not anyone.

“Some what?” he asked John again. “Say it. What were you gonna call him?”

“Mind your tone with me, son.”

“Or what?” Dean asked breathlessly, feeling like he’d left his body and something else was piloting it around. “What, am I going to be grounded? If I disrespect you the way you do me?”

John pointed a finger into Dean’s face. “That’s not how you speak to me,” he said.

Dean sucked in a breath and stood his ground, but didn’t even get the chance to say anything further. Castiel was suddenly there, sliding his arm and shoulder over Dean’s chest, pushing Dean behind him, face turned up to John fearlessly.

“It’s me you’re upset with,” Castiel said. “I’m the one who showed up here without your permission. You’re mad at me. And I’m right here.”

“Castiel,” Dean murmured, putting a hand on his shoulder only to be pushed back a little further.

“Come on,” Castiel said, jutting his jaw out.

“Son…” John said helplessly, sinking back a step and lowering his hand. “What do you think is happening here?”

“If you want to be mad at somebody, be mad at me,” Castiel said stubbornly, arm like an iron bar across Dean’s chest.

John just stared, and stared, and Dean wanted to throw up. The watercolor bloom of purple bruising over Castiel’s eye had gone green around the edges, and here he was practically asking for another. For Dean. Then John’s hand came up toward Castiel, who didn’t flinch a bit, just lifted his chin to take whatever he thought was coming, and it settled on Castiel’s shoulder.

“It’s good of you,” John said gruffly. “To want to protect him. I wouldn’t hurt him, but it’s good of you.”

Castiel’s face went tight with embarrassment, and he drew his arm away from Dean and retreated from John’s hand.

“I… apologize,” he said. “I’ve overstepped again.”

“It’s fine,” Dean said.

“We can look at the car later,” John said. “It’s just about time to eat, ain’t it?” He gestured toward the house. “Heard you boys have been cooking up a storm in there.” He took a couple of steps toward the door, though neither of them followed him.

Castiel turned away, stared down the street, and fumbled to light a cigarette. “Dean? I… I think I have to go.”

“Oh,” Dean said. His heart broke so hard, he heard the snap of it and felt the aftershocks of it all the way down to his hands and feet. He’d known it might go this way, but that didn’t make it hurt less. “Okay.”

John turned back halfway to the house as he realized they weren’t following him. He walked right past where Dean stood frozen and zeroed in on Castiel. He reached out and put his hand on Castiel’s shoulder again, standing just behind him.

“I’m not going to ask you to explain any of that.”

“Great,” Castiel said in a voice dry as the Arizona desert, facing out toward the street.

“Why don’t you come on inside, son? Mary and Dean both want to look after you, and it would do ‘em good if you’d let ‘em.”

Castiel’s shoulders shuddered under John’s hand, and his hands curled into tight fists at his sides, letting the cigarette drop to the sidewalk. “I can’t.”

“I understand,” John said. “S’hard for me, too. But right now, all you gotta do is go sit at the table and eat the food you helped prepare. That’s all.”

“I can’t,” Castiel gasped. His knuckles were white.

“I think you can.”

Dean stood there, feeling useless, his tongue a dead weight in his mouth. Watched Castiel’s shoulders shaking as he kept his back turned, but didn’t try to move away from John’s hand.

Dean had felt John’s hand squeeze his own shoulder just like that, so many times. When he learned how to ride a bike. When he changed out a carburetor the first time without help. When he broke up with Jo, when Cassie broke up with him. When he got sick with the flu and went on stage for the lead role in the school play anyway and got a standing ovation. When John handed him the keys to Baby on his eighteenth birthday. When he was twenty-two and he’d got in her with his bags in the backseat and stars in his eyes, ready to drive to California.

John wasn’t a perfect father, not by any means. But he tried. And Dean knew how fucking good that hand felt.

Castiel swallowed, and swallowed again, and shook, and none of them said a word. Finally, he took a deep breath, and sighed it out.

Still with his back turned, he said, “Give me a couple of minutes and pretend you don’t notice what I smell like when I come inside.”

John took a second to think on that, then laughed out loud, and lifted his hand just to bring it down again in a firm clap on Castiel’s shoulder.

“Boy, if you brought mary jane, you best believe that’s a girl I’d like to make time with.”

Castiel finally turned, and stared at John in surprise. His face was damp, and Dean wanted to go to him, but he made his feet stay still.

“What?” John asked, puffing out his chest. “You thought I’d be shocked? I grew up in the seventies.”

Dean muffled a disbelieving snicker.

“You… want to smoke with me?” Castiel asked cautiously.

“Better bring it on through to the back yard so the fucking busybody across the street won’t see it,” John said, grinning. “I haven’t done it since I was a kid. That turkey’s gonna taste damn good with a little herb on it.” He turned and strode into the house. “Mary! You want to smoke some dope with me?”

“John Winchester, you better close the damn door before you start shouting like that!” she shouted. “But hell yes, I do!”

Dean was laughing as he approached Castiel, who was still standing there with a shocked look at his face, but it fell away as he lifted his hands to touch Castiel’s face, wipe away the dampness with his palms, trailing his thumbs across Castiel’s cheeks until his hands were running through Castiel’s hair.

“Hey,” he said. “You sure?”

A tiny smile, more in Castiel’s eyes than on his lips, started forming. “I’m sure.”

“Think you might be the bravest, stubbornest person I’ve ever met,” Dean murmured.

“I don’t think ‘stubbornest’ is a word, Dean.”

“Gonna kiss you now.”

“What about the busybody across the street?” Castiel asked, the smile finally reaching the corners of his mouth.

“Let’s put on a show for ‘em,” Dean said, and kissed him. Kept a hand to the back of his head, let the other press at the small of his back, tipped him just a little, like it was the big climactic scene in a romance movie.

Castiel had bought a shitload of pot in New Mexico, so luckily there was enough to go around when they all trooped into the backyard. Cassie didn’t want any, but everybody else partook, even Sam. Cassie went ahead and filled her wine glass with about half a bottle, so she was just as giggly and relaxed as the rest of them when they went inside to eat. John and Mary, eyes a little red, looked at Jo and Cassie holding hands and playing footsie on one side of the table, Dean and Castiel with their thighs and shoulders pressed together on the other side, Sam practically asleep in his mashed potatoes next to them, and beamed like they’d never been happier.

It was late, Jo and Cassie were long gone with their share of the leftovers, when Dean woke from a couch nap and looked around blearily. A football game was on and John was snoring softly in his armchair, while Sam was in the other armchair texting somebody.

“Where’s Mom and Cas?” Dean asked, his voice raspy.

Sam looked up. “Think Cas went to bed, actually. Not sure where Mom went.”

Dean decided to make a little circuit of the backyard to work out the kinks in his leg before he went upstairs. He went through the kitchen, sort of expecting to see Mary there cleaning up a little bit, but she wasn’t there. He figured she must have gone to bed, too.

When he stepped out into the backyard, he saw her right away, sitting wrapped up in an old blanket in a patio chair in the dark.

“Mom?”

“Hey, Dean,” she said, voice muffled.

“Mom, are you cryin’?” he asked, limping urgently toward her.

“No,” she said, even though she obviously was.

He lowered himself into the chair next to her and grabbed her hand. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” she said, her voice wobbling.

“Mom.”

“It’s a good thing that you’re happy, Dean. Don’t worry about me.”

“You don’t want me to be?”

“It’s not that, baby,” she said. “I just miss you, that’s all. Miss when you were a little boy, and you’d sing and dance for me in the kitchen, and help me make lunch for you and your brother. I guess I’m still not used to the idea that you’re all grown up now.”

Dean let go of her hand, and turned to face her with a frown.

“You’re not upset that I grew up,” he said, feeling something inside him ripping, bleeding, as they finally said the thing they had always tried not to say. “You’re upset that I didn’t want to marry Cassie and work in the garage with Dad for the rest of my life. You’re upset that I’m happy where I am.”

“I’m trying not to be,” she said.

“You could try harder,” he said, and stood up.

“Dean, what are you going to do if your career doesn’t recover?”

The enormous pressure on his chest. He couldn’t breathe. He looked up, fighting tears. Some of the cloud cover had broken up, and there were a few stars out. 

“Dunno,” he said dully. “Maybe Cas will be my sugar daddy. Maybe I’ll find something else. But I won’t come back here, and you’ll have to get used to it.”

“Dean,” she said in a stronger tone, like she was going to lecture him.

“I’m going to bed,” he said, and left her there.

The stairs had never seemed so easy to climb as when he knew Castiel was waiting in his bed at the top of them.

Castiel wasn’t actually asleep, he was just laying on the bed with the laptop open. Watching… oh, god, watching Where There Is Darkness. Of course he was watching one of Dean’s movies.

“Dean,” he said, sitting up quickly.

“Are you seriously going to watch every movie I’ve ever been in? I’m only in this one for like thirty seconds!”

Castiel didn’t argue. He just closed the laptop and reached his hands out, pulled Dean onto the mattress beside him.

“You’re upset?” he asked.

“Mmm,” Dean said. The pressure was easing as Castiel’s arms went around him. “I’m just ready to go home.”

“Okay,” Castiel said, dropping a quick kiss on him. He stood up and shoved the laptop into its bag, and started gathering up the clothes he’d dropped on the floor when he’d gotten into bed. “Give me ten minutes.”

“Cas,” Dean said. “I meant tomorrow.”

“Oh,” he said, sounding slightly disgruntled as he let the clothes fall back to the floor.

“Tell me something, Castiel. If I asked you to get the moon for me, what would you do?”

Castiel tapped his fingers on his leg. “I feel like you’re making fun of me.”

“Now I kinda want to hear your answer.”

“I’m supposed to say something dramatic like build a spaceship and lasso it for you, right? But I’d probably just buy you a telescope.”

Dean held out his arms, coaxed Castiel back onto the bed. “Just take me on another observatory date, how’s that?”

“I didn’t even think you liked it that much.”

“I liked how much you liked it. Wish I could make you that happy more often.”

Castiel stroked Dean’s scarred cheek and looked at him long and open; let Dean see him. “You do.”

Chapter Text

They dropped the rental off at the Enterprise in Lawrence first thing on Friday morning and hit the road in Dean’s car. Castiel was just as insane behind her wheel as he was with the rental, but the difference was that Baby liked it that way. They went through Wichita and Oklahoma City so they could end their day in Amarillo and see the Cadillac Ranch. Castiel needed to be back at work on Monday, so they couldn’t take it as easy on the way home as they had on the way out, but he’d insisted that they had to see at least one stupid tourist thing. They’d make it back to Flagstaff on Saturday night, then get home on Sunday afternoon.

Dean had a whole collection of his parents’ old tapes that he kept in the car, since she only had a tape deck. They listened to Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, the Grateful Dead, the Eagles. Dean watched Castiel driving his Baby, his long fingers confident on her wheel, his kissable lips wrapped around a cigarette after Dean had given him permission to smoke. Humming along to “James Dean,” tapping his fingers in time. Every time Dean thought he’d gotten used to how handsome Castiel was, he noticed it all over again.

Yeah, he looked good driving Dean’s car. He looked even better when Dean made him pull over on an abandoned stretch of road just off the highway so Dean could suck his dick while he was splayed out on the hood of the car, right there in front of God and everybody under the great big Texas sky.

Dean finished reading The Martian when they got back in the car to finish the drive, voice a little rough, with Castiel’s hand on his thigh. It was probably the first time Dean had ever given conscious thought to the fact that his car didn’t have a center console, and that thought was ‘awesome.’

When he finished the book, he put his phone down, and watched the road as Baby ate it up with her tires.

“Hey, Cas?” he asked quietly.

“Hm?”

“I know labeling this was just for my parents’ benefit,” he said, and stopped. Watched the road, felt the curious and silent gaze on the side of his face. “Uh, we could keep it, though. If you want.”

Castiel was quiet for a long time.

“It’s fine if you don’t,” Dean said, and scooted a little further over toward the passenger window. “It’s been an intense few days, things are gonna feel different when we’re back home.”

“Your dad,” Castiel said, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. “Told me I’d better take care of you. Treat you right.”

“Ah, hell, sorry about that.”

Castiel didn’t look at him, but Dean could see the edge of his bitter smile. “I want to, Dean. I’m just… not sure if I can. I can’t even take care of myself.”

“It’s not all up to you,” Dean said. “I gotta take care of you, too.”

“You might not always find that very pleasant.”

“Maybe I think it’s worth it,” Dean said.

They were sitting two feet apart on opposite ends of the bench seat, both of them hidden behind sunglasses and talking over and around instead of to each other, and Dean was frustrated.

“Never mind,” he muttered.

Castiel suddenly reached out, cupped his big, warm hand over the back of Dean’s neck. “I’m not saying no. I’m saying… we’ll have to make it up as we go.”

Dean turned to him, and Castiel was looking back. Just a flick of his eyes, because he had to watch the road. Dean scooted back in and let Castiel put an arm around his shoulders, and turned up the music.

Dean got the phone call while kicking up dust at the Cadillac Ranch, taking dumb selfies with Castiel in between the brightly-painted cars after a solemn vow not to put them on Instagram. He almost ignored the call, since it was an unfamiliar number, but after it rang out, his phone immediately started buzzing again with the same number. So he decided to pick it up. If it was a spam call, he’d just sic Castiel on them. It would be enriching for him to get a free pass to be an asshole to a stranger, probably.

“This is Dean Winchester,” Dean answered cautiously.

“Mr. Winchester,” said a crisp, female voice he’d only heard once before. “It’s Toni Bevell.”

“Oh, uh, hello Ms. Bevell,” he said, straightening his shoulders and tucking his stomach in by pure instinct. “What can I do for you?”

“It’s come to my attention that Mr. Ketch has been failing to give your portfolio the consideration it’s due,” she said.

“Oh, god,” Dean said, flicking a glance at Castiel. “I’m really sorry about the whole thing with the lawyer, I didn’t mean that, I was just pissed at Ketch—”

“I’m not calling for your apology,” she said in her cold voice, and Dean shut up. “I’m calling to explain that I’ll be working with you personally from now on.”

Dean stared at some car graffiti without really seeing it. He couldn’t think of anything to say. Toni Bevell only took a bare handful of the agency’s clients, only the ones who were already minor-league successful and needed her contacts to break into the next level. This didn’t make any sense. Dean wasn’t anywhere near what she usually took on, not even before his accident.

“You have potential, Mr. Winchester, and I get results. I’m not going to let Ketch fumble the ball with a client like you.”

“I don’t know what to say,” Dean finally said. “It’s an honor?”

“Yes, it is,” she said. “I’ve sent you a script and secured you an audition for Tuesday afternoon. I trust you’ll be there?”

Dean was already scrambling to open his email. “Ms. Bevell, did you send me the wrong script? This is a leading role.”

“Don’t insult me. I know what I sent you.”

“Are you sure?” he breathed out, squeezing Castiel’s hand without even realizing that he was holding it.

“You need to understand, Mr. Winchester, that all I can do is get you into the room. You’re the one who will have to fight for this role. Can you do that?”

Castiel was looking at him, steady and hopeful, his hand in Dean’s.

“Yeah,” Dean said. “Yes, I can do that.”

“Excellent. I’d like to see you on Tuesday before your audition. Be in my office at two o’clock.”

“How d’you know I don’t have other plans at that time?” Dean asked.

“I know that you’ll cancel them and be in my office at two o’clock,” she said.

“I’ll see you then,” Dean said, but she had already hung up on him before he’d completely finished speaking.

Castiel was crowding up on him. “Dean,” he said eagerly.

Dean pointed a finger at him. “Don’t start thinking this makes you right, Cas. Threatening to sue people isn’t always the answer.”

Castiel had a very unrepentant smile on his face. “Of course, Dean.”

“We need to find a hotel, right now.”

Castiel’s smile fell. “Is it your leg?”

“No, you idiot. I need someplace to drink champagne and fuck your brains out.”

Castiel snapped to attention, and immediately headed for the car. “Okay, well, this is an emergency, obviously. Let’s go.”

They got into Los Angeles on Sunday afternoon, halfway through reading Cat’s Cradle and both of them so sick of being in a car that they were numb and exhausted, even though they’d only been awake for eight hours and the sun was still up.

“Jesus,” Castiel sighed as he pulled the car into Dean’s parking space. “I’m going on a fast. Or at least a diet.”

Dean let out an exaggerated groan as he kicked his door open. “Right? Road trips are fun as hell but I always wind up regretting all the diner food by about the third day.”

“I’m never eating beef jerky again. Never, Dean.”

They were laughing and joking as they entered the apartment, and Dean bellowed, “Lucy, I’m home!”

Charlie was nowhere to be seen, but Meg was. She was standing by the open refrigerator, in nothing but her underwear, chugging orange juice directly out of the carton. Dean gaped at her.

“Hello, boys. Do I have some ‘splainin to do?”

Castiel snorted as he pushed past Dean and set their bags on the living room couch. “Only if you’re not banging Charlie.”

Meg just shrugged and went back to her orange juice.

“Not that you don’t have a fantastic rack, but do you really need to let it all hang out in my kitchen?” Dean asked.

Meg grinned. “Damn right I do.”

“It had better be fantastic,” Castiel said. “That rack was fucking expensive.”

“Oh, you’re back!” Charlie said, bouncing out of her room in boxer shorts and a t-shirt with surprised Pikachu on it. “Cas, why do you know how much Meg’s tits cost?”

“Because I paid half,” he answered readily.

“Solid investment,” Charlie replied, stealing the orange juice carton from Meg and taking a swig for herself.

“I know, right?” Castiel and Meg said simultaneously, then started laughing in tandem.

“Okay!” Dean said loudly. “Number one, cover ‘em up around the person in the room who hasn’t touched ‘em. Number two, we own drinking glasses, you fucking heathens!”

Meg walked over and basically thrust her boobs at Dean. “Honestly, it’s only fair.”

“No, thank you,” he said, and took off his jacket to drape around her, knowing that his cheeks were going red and unable to do a damn thing about it.

“What, are you transphobic?”

“No!” Dean squealed. “Why does not wanting to see you naked have to be transphobic? I don’t—Cas!”

Castiel had started laughing hard enough to hurt his ribs, and was sinking down onto the sofa. “You’re on your own,” he wheezed.

“Fine!” Dean shouted, and cupped Meg’s breasts in his hands and gave them a quick jiggle. “They’re great! Now put a shirt on!”

Meg cackled all the way back to Charlie’s bedroom to put Dean out of his misery.

Two hours later, the four of them had gathered back into the living room after Dean and Castiel had both taken a shower and started some laundry. They’d given up on the idea of fasting by then, so Meg ordered Moroccan food, and they ate vegetable bastillas and lamb tagine together while telling Meg and Charlie about their road trip. Dean could tell the day was coming to an end. Castiel was clearly thinking more about going back to work tomorrow than about the company with him now, judging by the way he drummed his fingers on the table and chewed at his fingernail. He was trying to be here, but it wasn’t working.

Dean took him out on the fire escape to smoke a bowl, but it didn’t seem to help much. Castiel went back inside and sat next to Meg on the couch and put his head on her shoulder. She automatically started petting his hair.

“I know, babe,” she said, a private sympathy that ignored both Dean and Charlie. “If you have to go, that’s okay.”

“I don’t want to,” he said.

“So don’t.”

He shoved away from her with a growl. “You’re being deliberately provocative, Meg, and I don’t appreciate it.”

She was unimpressed. Her smirk held no sympathy. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He growled, and stood up. He looked at Dean, who was looking at him, and snatched him by the wrist and dragged him down the hall to Dean’s bedroom. Dean could just barely keep up. Castiel slammed the door behind them.

“What’s going on, Cas?”

“Fuck me,” Castiel said imperiously.

“Jesus,” Dean said. “Charlie and Meg are, like, right there. You don’t want to at least wait until they go to bed?”

Castiel crowded him up against the closet door. “I want you, you want me, so what’s the problem?”

“The problem is that I’m tired and don’t feel like it,” Dean said, scowling. “Not convinced that you do, either.”

Castiel kissed him, hard and bruising. “Does it seem like I don’t feel like it?”

Dean turned his head aside. “Come on, man. This sucks.”

“Fine. Then I’ll go find somebody who will,” Castiel said, pushing away from him.

Dean grabbed fistfuls of Castiel’s shirt. “Don’t do this.”

“I’m not doing anything. I’m horny, I have exactly twelve hours before I need to be in the office and ready for whatever bullshit is waiting for me, and I don’t have time to wait for you to feel like it.”

Dean laughed, feeling it bubble up from an ugly dark place in his stomach.

“What’s so funny?”

“I don’t know, I guess I just convinced myself during the trip that maybe you liked me more than you liked wallowing in your fucking issues.”

Castiel ugly-laughed right back. “Pot. Kettle.”

“No,” Dean said. He felt oddly calm, like he stood in the eye of a storm. “No, not this time. I did have issues, I know that. I was really unhappy for a while. I hated myself. I acted out. I drank too much. And you know what I did? I fucking left. I packed up my car and found a place where I could be myself and be happy. Don’t tell me I’m fucking wallowing, man, because I had to fight like hell to be where I am and you don’t get to shit all over that just to make yourself feel better.”

Castiel’s shirt was still clutched in his hands. Castiel took a step away from him, but Dean couldn’t let go. He tried, but his hands wouldn’t obey.

“I don’t need this,” Castiel seethed, and brought his hands down to push on Dean’s wrists, trying to break his grip. “I have enough goddamn problems, I don’t need this from you.”

“I’m not doing anything,” Dean said. “I’m just standing here. You’re the one who wants to pick a fight.”

“Bullshit,” Castiel said. “You don’t have to say it out loud, I know what you want.”

“Yeah? What do I want?”

“You want me to change. You want me to rebel against my family, and leave them behind, and you think it will fix me. You want me sober. You want me to stay with you.”

Dean couldn’t breathe, and he couldn’t let go, either. His hands shook with how hard he was holding onto Castiel’s shirt.

“That’s a lot of guessing, Castiel. Sounds to me like maybe that’s what you want.”

“No, I don’t!” he shouted, and his hands finally came down hard enough to break Dean’s hold on him. “Don’t tell me what I want!”

“Don’t tell me what I think, then!”

“I’m not like you!” Castiel shouted, and thumped himself on the chest. “I’m a good son!”

Dean had promised not to ever lay a hand on him. He’d promised. But his hands had to do something, and he was out of his body, helplessly watching the way he swept all his things off his dresser, sent trinkets and books shooting into a corner, clattering and thumping onto the carpet.

“Don’t you ever say that to me,” Dean said, the words coming from that dark pit somewhere deep in him.

“I’m…” Castiel took a step away, and his eyes were horrified. “I…”

Castiel sat down on the bed, buried his head in his hands, and went silent.

“Fuck you,” Dean said.

“I know,” Castiel answered, muffled.

“No, fuck you, Castiel.”

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean that.”

If Dean stayed, he didn’t know what he might say. So he walked out. Charlie and Meg weren’t in sight; they had likely gone into Charlie’s room as soon as they’d heard the fight start.

He let his feet decide where he was going. He just floated and watched his body move on its own. He walked to the Metro station and got on the first train that came by. He was definitely wearing his attitude on his sleeve, judging by the way nobody wanted to sit anywhere near him. Some kid was watching TikTok videos with no headphones on a few seats down, but when he looked up and saw Dean looking at him, he abruptly turned his phone off and went to sit somewhere else.

Dean rode the couple of stops it took to get to the pier and got off. The Park was closed up already, which made sense considering it was a Sunday night in November, but Dean wasn’t here to ride the fucking Ferris wheel anyway. He was grateful that there weren’t many people around, in fact. He walked out onto the beach. He didn’t make it far; the sun had already set, so it was hard to see anything, and his knee wasn’t really up for it yet, anyway. When his knee went out from under him, he was expecting it, and just let himself go down in a controlled fall. He landed in the forgivingly soft sand, then drew his legs in to sit and look at the water.

He thought about himself, six months ago, running shirtless down this beach with a surfboard under his arm, soaking up attention. A beautiful person surrounded by beautiful people, living a charmed and carefree life. That was who he’d thought he was always going to be.

His fist hit the sand. The soft give of it felt unsatisfying, so he did it again, then again. He pounded his fists down and felt it build up in his chest until he was yelling. Wordless in fury and grief, he shouted at the ocean, which swallowed it all and didn’t care about him. The other couple of people walking around didn’t even glance at him.

He pounded, and screamed, until his throat started to hurt and he choked. When he stopped, he was exhausted. He fell back limply to lay in the sand.

He closed his eyes. He heard the cries of sea birds fighting over dropped bits of churros and french fries, the shrill tantrum of an overstimulated toddler being bundled into the booster seat of a car in the nearby parking lot. But stronger, closer, getting louder as he focused, was the hush and roar of the waves of the ocean. Like static, but deeper.

One came rushing in, then fizzed out. Then another.

Dean’s heartbeat slowed. His breathing slowed.

In, and out.

He opened his eyes. The moonlight was dim, but he could see the white foam lace on the crest of the waves as they came lapping up a few yards in front of him. The sky and sea were indistinct from one another. Huge, and dark, and endless. And Dean was a tiny little speck at the edge of its vastness, but he lived there. He lived on this little scrap of earth, and he loved the other specks who lived here with him. It was like Castiel had said. About being both large and small. About feeling like any moment, you were going to fall off the edge and disappear into the black.

Dean laid there for a long time, breathing in time with the waves. Eventually, he got up and limped his way home.

He could hear Meg and Charlie talking to each other in Charlie’s room when he came inside, but Castiel wasn’t there. Dean wasn’t sure if he’d expected him to be or not.

Dean called him, not totally believing that he’d answer but still hoping. His breath whooshed out of him when the call connected.

“Dean,” Castiel grunted, sounding annoyed.

“Where are you?”

A pause. “Don’t ask stupid questions,” Castiel muttered.

Dean walked into his bedroom, and saw that his things had been cleaned up and carefully rearranged on top of his dresser. “Are you safe?”

The sound of Castiel’s bitter laugh was even more painful through the phone. “Not really. This is a weird way to break up with me, Dean.”

“I’m not.”

“Not what?”

“Breaking up with you,” Dean said, taking a cigarette from the pack Castiel had apparently abandoned on his nightstand. He crawled out onto the fire escape. He’d never smoked cigarettes before and didn’t now, but he lit it and held it between his lips anyway, watching the smoke curl off the tip and disappear into the dark.

Castiel scoffed. “Well, you should.”

“Well, I’m not. Are you breaking up with me?”

“I never even agreed we were together,” Castiel said. Dean heard a swell of chattering voices in the background on Castiel’s end, somebody calling his name. “I have to go.”

“You can come back here,” Dean said quickly. “Whenever you want, you can come here.”

Castiel inhaled to speak, but then he ended the call.

Dean let the cigarette burn out and went to bed.

“‘It just seems like…all poets do is suffer, all the time. Even the ones who make it to a few decades, they just…I mean is that a choice that poets have to make? To let depression and alcoholism take over and kill you, or to…fight these major external forces and almost die in the process? Like Byron did both, right, ‘cause he went off looking for wars but he also totally self-destructed?’”

Dean was looking at a woman with long blond hair pulled back into a sleek ponytail, but he’d gone away into the mind of his character, Jack Allen, and his character was looking at his poetry teacher. He was waiting to be told that he was allowed to be happy, and he held his body on tenterhooks and let the desperation of it shine in his eyes.

“‘No, Jack,’” the woman recited, flat as she read off the page, “‘that is not a choice a poet has to make, anymore than other people who drink, are depressed, fight wars. It was quite the opposite for Dennis Brutus, in fact. He said, if he had spent more time on poetry, he would have been a better poet. But working to end apartheid and other injustices in the world was more important work. And that is how he chose to spend his time.’”

“‘So?’” He licked his lips, felt his hands clutch too hard at his bag on his lap.

“‘So he did not sacrifice the life he chose to lead for his poetry. And still his verse was beautiful. Do you understand?’”

“‘He’s one guy. Maybe he was just strong.’”

And that was it. The woman tossed the script onto the low table between them, and turned to look at the casting director a few feet away. The casting director stood up and walked forward with her hand out to shake Dean’s. It took him a moment to remember where he was, and he stood up too abruptly when he rose to meet her.

“Thank you very much, Mr. Winchester,” she said. “Just a quick question: what made you decide to give Jack a limp?”

Dean wanted to apologize. He wanted to tell her it would go away soon, that it was just a sprained ankle or something. But Toni Bevell had, just an hour ago, told him he didn’t have to do that anymore.

“I didn’t,” he said, and patted his leg. “That’s all mine. Got it when I got this,” he said, pointing up at the scar on his face.

“Interesting,” she said.

It was the exact word Castiel had used, and it broke through Dean’s nerves and made him smile at her with too much sincerity. The polite smile she’d been wearing became suddenly warmer in response.

“Thank you for the opportunity, ma’am.”

“Certainly. Kate, why don’t you show our next candidate in, please,” she said, as Dean limped out.

He was always jittery for a while after an audition, but he had limited options for how to dispel it. His friends were all at work, and his leg was still sore from the beach walk on Sunday night and his PT appointment yesterday. So he just treated himself to a milkshake from The Counter and went home. He’d probably do exactly what he’d done yesterday: think too much about the argument with Castiel and wonder whether he’d ever see him again.

There was somebody sitting in front of his door, back slumped against it and head drooping forward, seeming to be asleep. Great. That was great. Dean did not begrudge the drunk and/or homeless for finding a place to rest in the shade where they were less likely to get the cops called on them, but this was the third floor of a random apartment building in a random neighborhood in Santa Monica—how did they wind up here, of all places?

The person looked up when they heard his footsteps, and Dean’s heart made a weird, painful, sideways leap in his chest, because it was Castiel. He scrambled to his feet when he saw Dean.

“Um. Hello, Dean,” Castiel said, biting his lip.

“Cas,” Dean said, uncertainly, taking a step forward then stopping.

“I, um. Wanted to congratulate you on your audition,” he said, reaching into his pocket and bringing out a small gift-wrapped box.

“Thank you,” Dean said, taking it and putting it in his own pocket. He didn’t let himself expect anything more than this quick exchange and Castiel taking off again. He reached around Castiel to unlock the door. “You want to come in?”

Castiel didn’t say anything, but he did follow him inside. He looked around like he was seeing the place for the first time again.

“You want something to drink?” Dean asked, already heading for the fridge.

“Um, some water would be… please,” Castiel said.

Dean brought a glass to him, and then they just stood there and stared at each other for a minute. Dean didn’t have anything to say. The ball was so incredibly in Castiel’s court right now.

“I want to talk to you,” Castiel said, looking away. “If you’re willing.”

“Did I somehow give you the impression that I wasn’t?”

“I… no. I’m just. Fucking bad at this,” Castiel said. “Sorry.”

Dean sighed, and scrubbed a hand over his mouth, fighting the urge to kiss him. “Okay, let’s just, whatever, let’s just go sit down and do this, then,” gesturing toward the window to the fire escape.

Castiel went first, and turned to hold his hand out to help Dean climb out, but Dean waved him off to do it himself. He couldn’t handle being allowed even that small amount of touching right now. He sat on one of the steps and Castiel sat on the landing. Castiel lit up a cigarette, and spoke on the exhale of his first drag, a curling cloud spilling out of his mouth with his words.

“I’m really tired of my own bullshit,” he said, looking up and meeting Dean’s eyes boldly. “I promised myself I wouldn’t turn out like this, and then I did it anyway.”

Dean bit his tongue.

“The first thing I want to say is how sorry I am for what I said to you the other day.”

Dean didn’t look away. Let Castiel see how fucking bad that had hurt him.

“I regret it so much, Dean. I don’t even know why I... I’m so sorry.”

“Thank you,” Dean said, testing it out on himself even as he was saying it. Not sure if he was ready to forgive until he realized he already had.

“The other thing I wanted to do was tell you about this,” Castiel said as he rolled up his sleeve and showed Dean his tattoo.

“Oh,” Dean said, the word punching out of him. He knew without having to be told that this was extremely fucking significant, so he scooted down a step, close enough to be able to touch Castiel if he wanted to. He didn’t, yet. But he watched Castiel rub this thumb across his tattooed skin and licked his lips. “Okay, I’m listening.”

“I got it so I would never forget that it was possible. That I could do it again.”

“Do what?”

“I got this after I left my family.”

Dean’s head snapped up to look at his face. “What?”

Castiel was still looking down. “When I was nineteen, I realized that my definition of helping people didn’t really line up with my family’s views on it, and I… I wanted to try my own thing. It was my second year at Stanford. I didn’t drop out, because my father would have noticed; I just stopped showing up for classes. I got a job at a gas station so I could pay for rent and for EMT training. I moved and changed my phone number without telling anyone in my family. That’s how I met Meg; she was looking for a roommate.. I completed all the EMT coursework and got my certification and started working on an ambulance crew. I was employed for all of three weeks.”

“What happened?”

“We were dispatched to an attempted suicide. It was… it was Anna. Gabe was there, and he was so distraught, he didn’t even realize it was me until we got her into the ambulance and he started asking to ride with us so he could stay with her. He wasn’t going to rat me out, but Aunt Amara and Uncle Michael were already at the hospital when we got there. They saw me.”

“And they told your dad?”

“Of course. Dad found out where I lived and came and just… took all my stuff and took it back to my dorm at the university. He was waiting for me in my empty room when I got home from my shift. Told me that he knew that I was a better son than to do that to him. A good son wouldn’t walk away from him like my mother did. He said that he… that he loved me, and he wanted the best for me, and I needed to trust him to know what that was. And he said he’d ruin Meg’s life if I didn’t obey. She wasn’t in a good place at the time. I couldn’t do that to her, so I agreed to go back to school. Then he beat the shit out of me, obviously, because apparently the lesson doesn’t stick if you don’t still feel it a week later.”

“Jesus,” Dean said. His hand was cupping the crown of Castiel’s head, pulling him close, ruffling through his hair. “Tell me you know how messed up that is.”

“I know,” Castiel said.

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because you’re right,” Castiel said. “I’m a hypocrite. I’m not nineteen anymore, and Meg isn’t, either, and I could leave.”

“So, why don’t you?”

Castiel looked up at him, at last, and Dean thought about the moon over the ocean and about the stars over the desert. His eyes felt like something Dean could fall off the earth and get lost in.

“It would be you that he’d hold over my head, this time.”

Dean touched his fingertips to the green-brown faded bruise around Castiel’s cheekbone. “Castiel… I’m not scared of your dad. He wants to ruin my life? Like, what, more than Gabe already did?”

Castiel closed his eyes, grief clear in the set of his mouth.

“I’m not gonna be the reason you let this happen to you,” Dean said. “You understand? I can’t—I can’t take responsibility for that. You can’t put that on me.”

“Dean,” Castiel said urgently, covering Dean’s hand with his own, pressing it against his bruised cheekbone hard enough to hurt. “It isn’t your responsibility, but you are the reason I want to try. I want… I want to get out.” He rose up onto his knees just to fall forward into Dean’s already reaching arms. “I want you. I want this.”

“Okay,” Dean said.

“Okay?”

“You can have it, Cas. Me, this, whatever it is. You can have it.”

“I don’t know how,” he said, and he was shaking, burying his face into Dean’s chest. “I know how to want, I can never stop wanting, and all I can ever do is try to make it hurt less. I don’t know anything about having.”

“I don’t know much, either. But I’m here.”

“And you don’t want me to go?”

“No, sweetheart,” Dean said. He kissed Castiel’s hair. “No, I like you where you are.”

“Dean,” Castiel whispered into his collarbone, hands sliding over Dean’s hips. “Dean, please. I need you.”

Dean had his arms around Castiel, and he hugged him tight. “What do you need?”

“I need to get out of my head,” he begged. “I don’t want to go looking for that elsewhere anymore. I want it to be with you.”

It was a hell of a thing, to feel like your dick was the only thing preventing a guy from walking out in search of some other high. Dean was definitely going to get a weird complex about it. It didn’t stop him from taking Castiel into the bedroom, though. Forcing Castiel on his hands and knees and fucking him until Castiel was crying his name into a pillow.

They cooked dinner together, afterward, and when Charlie got home to find Castiel there, she burst into tears and gave him a weepy hug that made him blush. They all tangled up together in a pile on the couch to watch Casablanca, and Castiel fell asleep with his legs in Charlie’s lap and his head in Dean’s. Dean turned down the volume, and looked over at Charlie.

“He can stay, right?” he whispered.

“Yeah, obviously,” Charlie said.

“I don’t mean sleeping on the couch tonight. I mean—”

“I know what you mean,” she said. “And the answer is: yeah. Obviously.”

“You’re fucking awesome, Charlie Bradbury.”

“I know,” she said.

Dean didn’t remember that he had a gift in his pocket until he woke Castiel up to brush his teeth and get in bed. He was slipping his pants off in his bedroom and felt the bump in his pocket.

“Oh, right,” he said, and Castiel blanched when he saw the little box in Dean’s hand, like he regretted it.

“It’s. It’s stupid,” Castiel said.

“I love stupid shit,” Dean said enthusiastically, and tore the gift paper off. Then he blinked at the little glass tube and its contents. “It’s… a rock?”

“It’s a moon rock.”

“You…” Dean trailed off. His heart felt too big, squeezed too tight into his chest. “Castiel. You got me the moon?”

Castiel tapped his fingers on his legs and looked away.

Dean tackled him onto the bed and demonstrated very thoroughly how much he appreciated it.

Castiel didn’t waste any time: the next morning, he sent an email and a certified letter by courier to his family’s law firm informing them of his resignation. Dean was there, eating chia pudding and sliced fruit in his underwear, when Castiel’s phone rang with his father’s name on the screen. Castiel’s voice was unwavering as he confirmed that he meant it and he wasn’t coming back and then immediately hung up. His hands were shaking uncontrollably, but he didn’t let it into his voice at all. And there was nothing Chuck could do about it, because he still didn’t know that Castiel had ever spoken to Dean Winchester at any point after 3:37 a.m. on the fourth of August. He certainly wouldn’t think to look for him at Dean Winchester’s apartment, which was where Castiel would be staying for at least a few days. Meg was staying there, too, just in case.

They went out and got an extra apartment key cut for Castiel, and Dean took him to a museum and then down to the pier to try to keep him occupied and from letting his nerves get the best of him. Castiel forced Dean to try little fried octopus balls and a hotdog that had seaweed on it from the Japadog cart. While Dean was trying to decide if he liked it or hated it, Castiel also called an outpatient rehab facility that could immediately take new clients and got himself booked for intake the next day. He was bafflingly calm about it, too.

“I made up my mind to change,” he shrugged when Dean pointed it out. “So that’s what I’m doing. If I could do this without help, I would have already done it, ergo: rehab.”

So Castiel went to get signed up the next day, and came home afterwards pissy and short-tempered, and Meg and Charlie took charge of soothing him while Dean went to work at Guidry’s and came home to a very cuddly and tired Castiel. Then he had his first therapy session the next day, and they did it all over again. For the first few days, everything seemed to go according to plan.

But three nights into this new routine, Castiel came back late, late enough that Dean had to go to work without seeing him, and worried during his whole shift at the theater about what had happened, even though he’d gotten the ‘everything’s fine’ text. When he got home around one in the morning, Castiel was still awake and waiting for him on the couch, watching a movie and wrapped in a blanket.

“Hey,” Dean said, hurrying over to him. “What happened?”

“Anna left,” he said, his eyes fixed to the TV.

“What do you mean?”

“They thought she knew where I was, and they tried to get it out of her, and she just walked out. Said she was quitting, too.”

“Fucking awesome,” Dean said. “Good for her.”

“She needed to go to urgent care and she couldn’t drive herself, so Ruby took her.”

“Less awesome.”

“And Ruby said she was done with L.A. anyway, and she told Anna that there was nothing here for her anymore, and Anna agreed. They packed up whatever would fit in the backseat of their cars, and they fucking… left. A few hours ago. They’re going to stay with some friends of Ruby’s in Atlanta, apparently. I guess all the making out wasn’t just for show.”

“You’re gonna miss her, huh?”

Castiel kept watching the screen. “I think she made the right choice.”

“Yeah, probably she did.”

“She asked me if I wanted to come with them,” Castiel said.

Dean’s stomach twisted. “Oh.”

“I don’t want to. But I…” He burrowed deeper into his blanket. “I don’t know. She’s my family.”

“She’s not your only family,” Dean said.

Castiel finally looked at him. “Dean,” he murmured.

“You gotta know that, Cas. That you have Meg, and Charlie, and me, and we’re not going anywhere.”

“Can we stay here for a while? I tried to go to bed, but I can’t sleep and laying around in the dark was, um, not good for me.”

“Yeah,” Dean said, sliding an arm around him. “Of course.”

“Would you read to me?” Castiel asked softly.

Dean immediately turned off the TV and grabbed Piranesi off the shelf, because it was his new recommendation from Charlie. Castiel laid his head on Dean’s shoulder and snuggled into him.

Dean cleared his throat, softened his voice. “‘When the Moon rose in the Third Northern Hall I went to the Ninth Vestibule to witness the joining of three Tides. This is something that only happens once every eight years…’”

Castiel was asleep on him inside of ten minutes.

Dean had his last physical therapy appointment on a Monday in mid-December, and Castiel picked him up afterward in his Beamer.

“How was therapy?” Castiel asked when Dean walked out of the clinic.

“Give me the keys and I’ll show you,” Dean grinned, lifting his right foot and giving it a wiggle of demonstration.

“You can drive?” Castiel asked, beaming.

Dean thought about it for a second and decided that he was responsible and mature enough to make the decision that wouldn’t lead to their fiery deaths. “Honestly, my first time in six months probably shouldn’t happen during Monday rush hour. I’ll drive next time. What about you? How was yours?”

Castiel grimaced. He actively loathed the mandated group therapy sessions for his rehab, but he went to them anyway because he didn’t want to lose his place in the program.

“I don’t like talking about my feelings,” he said conclusively as he slid into the driver’s seat.

Dean burst out laughing and practically fell into the car. “Join the club, pal.”

“Are you seriously calling me ‘pal?’ I’m your boyfriend.”

It was the first time Castiel had used that word seriously, and it startled Dean right out of his laughter. He stared at Castiel, who gave him a nervous, twitchy smile and drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. Dean quickly leaned over the console so he could get his hands on Castiel and kiss him breathless.

Dean’s phone started ringing before he was ready to let Castiel go, but it could’ve been about how his callback for his audition had gone, so he scrambled to take it.

“This is Dean Winchester.”

“Hello, gimpy,” said a familiar, raspy voice.

“Crowley? What the hell?”

“I need to see you in my office. It’s urgent.”

“Fucking what?”

“Get here before seven,” Crowley said, and hung up.

Dean gaped at Castiel. “Um. Sorry about this. I need you to drive me to see my lawyer that I don’t need anymore? Uh, his office is over in—”

“I know where it is,” Castiel said, starting the car and zipping out into traffic with his usual gut-clenching assertiveness.

“Why do you know that?”

Castiel shrugged. “I just do.”

“Why have you been to Crowley’s office, Castiel?”

Castiel was keeping his eyes on the road, which was not actually something Dean should be complaining about, but it was definitely an avoidance tactic and not Castiel suddenly transforming into a cautious driver.

“Just a couple of times when I was helping him prepare your case,” Castiel mumbled.

“Excuse me?”

“Nothing.”

“Crowley said he was working for free because he hates your family.”

“He does hate my family.”

“Did you fucking hire my lawyer for me, Castiel Shurley? Huh?”

“No,” Castiel said, unconvincingly.

“You are in so much fucking trouble right now. We’re gonna have a huge fight about this when I’m not hanging on for dear life.”

“You’re so dramatic,” Castiel huffed. “Fine, we’ll have a huge fight. Should I book myself an extra therapy appointment?”

“You’re such a bitch!”

“Thank you.”

Dean wanted to tell him that it wasn’t a compliment, but it kind of was, so he couldn’t. He moved on to wondering what the hell Crowley could possibly want. He’d said their appeal was rejected and that there was no further legal action they could take against Gabriel. Dean had assumed that would be the last time they ever spoke to each other. Unless he’d found some loophole? Loopholes seemed like a Crowley thing.

Castiel followed him up to Crowley’s office like he’d been invited, and Dean certainly wasn’t going to argue. Having some backup couldn’t hurt, especially not backup who was apparently familiar with both the details of the case and the lawyer who’d argued it. It was one of those office parks that had a thousand identical suites in it, and Dean nearly went into an insurance company office by mistake before remembering that Crowley’s door was the one with tinted glass.

Everybody was basically equally stunned when they walked inside and saw that Crowley was not alone.

“Cassie?” Gabriel said, eyes widening.

“Gabe?” Castiel squawked.

“Crowley, what the hell?” Dean yelled.

They all seemed to agree on that, and turned to glare at Crowley, who glared right back.

“If everybody could simmer down and take a seat,” he growled. “How was I to know you’d be dragging the prodigal son along?” he addressed Dean. “I don’t remember saying to bring a plus-one!”

“Yeah, well, why don’t we start with what the fuck Gabriel fucking Milton is doing here?”

Gabriel fucking Milton was slumping down in the plush office chair, looking about ten years older than he had during the summer.

“I asked Crowley to arrange this,” he said.

“Why?” Castiel asked, inserting his body in front of Dean’s. “Haven’t you done enough?”

Gabriel gave him a weary smile. “Yeah, that’s sort of why I’m here, kiddo.”

“Start making sense, Gabe,” Castiel growled. “And you,” he said, shooting a look at Crowley. “Get out.”

“It’s my bloody office!” Crowley said, going red in the face. “Why don’t you get out?”

“That’s a great idea,” Gabriel said, standing up and waving his hands at Castiel and Dean, gesturing them towards the door. “Thank you, Crowley.”

“Well, I’m not doing it out of the goodness of my fucking heart, am I?” Crowley snapped. “Goodbye, fuck off, and I hope nary a one of you darkens my doorstep ever again.”

“Wow,” Dean drawled. “I honestly thought you had a soft spot for me, Crowley.”

Crowley opened his mouth, went even redder, and pointed at the door with a growl. Dean chuckled a little as he followed the two cousins back out of the office and into the lobby.

Dean pointed a finger at Gabriel and advanced on him as he slowly backed toward the nearest wall, looking nervous. “So you’ve, what, paid Crowley to arrange a meeting with me? What the hell for?”

Gabriel ducked his head a little. He’d lost all his swagger, standing there with his shoulders slumped and letting Dean yell at him. “I paid him in blackmail material; he’d never do it for money.”

“Why would you want to see me so bad?”

“I’m here to apologize,” Gabriel said. “Seriously. For what I did, for what happened to you. For how it went in court, too. Aunt Naomi’s a fucking shark.”

“She’s not even your aunt,” Castiel said through gritted teeth.

“Listen. I know that what I did is unforgivable, and I’m not asking for that. I’m just here to tell you that… I’m sorry.”

“Why?” Dean asked, feeling more confused than angry. Why this, why now?

“Because I am,” Gabriel said. “And because Cas… man, it’s good to see you. You kind of kick-started the great family exodus, kid.”

“What?” Castiel asked faintly.

“I’m leaving,” Gabriel said.

“You’re going with Anna?”

“No,” Gabriel said. “With Kali.”

“Your ex-wife?”

“She didn’t file the divorce paperwork,” Gabriel shrugged. “She’s one in a million, I’ve always said it. She’s a goddamn powerhouse. She thinks I’ve changed. Said if I can stay that way, she’ll stay with me. And I know we gotta get out here if I want to make it work. So we’re uh, moving to London. She’s got family over there. Dad’s blowing up my phone, and Luke’s phone, and trying to get my parole officer to lose my paperwork, obviously, but guess who’s got two thumbs and doesn’t give a shit.”

“When?” Castiel asked hoarsely.

“Tomorrow morning.”

“Jesus,” Castiel said, and sat down heavily on a leather-padded bench. “Who else?”

“Just you, me, and Anna so far, but I’d put money on Bowser and Samandriel winding up in London with me before too long.” Gabriel was looking at Dean curiously when he said, “You could come, too, Cassie. If you want to.”

Castiel looked up with his face pale and dreadful. “Hester?”

Gabriel shrugged. “She seems happy where she is. She’s got a nice life, nice husband. Uncle Chuck mostly leaves her alone as long as she doesn’t embarrass him. It’s different for her.”

Dean thought back to Thanksgiving, and how readily Castiel threw himself in between Dean and John. And he thought maybe he knew why it would be different for Hester, and also maybe why she didn’t talk to her brother anymore.

“So, the offer’s out there,” Gabriel said, patting Castiel on the shoulder. “But I’m getting the idea that you’re probably not going to take me up on it.” He held out his hand to Dean. “One more for the road: sorry about everything.”

Dean stared at his hand.

“You take care of him, you hear me?” Gabriel said suddenly, taking a step closer and lifting his shoulders out of their submissive pose. “Cassie always acts so tough, but I know better. You better take care of him, Winchester.”

Dean’s hand closed over Gabriel’s and he shook it firmly. “I will. You, uh, you take care, too, man.”

Gabriel smiled at him. He made Castiel get up so he could give him a tight, lingering hug, and Dean saw Gabriel close his eyes and fight hard against some emotion. Castiel, for his part, seemed sort of numb. He barely even managed to respond enough to hug Gabriel back. Gabriel smacked him on the ass as he released him, and sauntered toward the door.

“All right, kids, I’m out of here. If you’re ever in London…”

And he was gone.

Castiel fell back down onto the bench, staring at the polished floor between his shoes.

“Castiel?” Dean asked, stepping closer. “You okay?”

“I broke it,” Castiel said, his fingernails digging into his palms. “I broke my family.”

“Somebody had to,” Dean said, and went to his knees between Castiel’s legs. It was a little difficult, but what was all the physical therapy for, if not to get back his ability to use his body the way he wanted to? “Isn’t it good that they all want to stand up for themselves and make their own choices?”

Castiel gave him a disbelieving look. “We were all each other had for so long. Nobody else could ever really understand. We love— I love them. I didn’t want it to be like this. I… I broke it.”

“It was already broken,” Dean said. “You were just the last straw.”

Castiel’s eyes welled up and spilled over. Dean hauled himself up to sit on the bench next to Castiel so he could hold onto him while he cried. It was awful, hysterical, gulping sobs of panic and grief, and Dean started to worry as it went on for kind of a long time.

“It’s gonna be okay,” he said. “I swear, you’re gonna be okay.”

Eventually, Castiel had exhausted himself, and raised his reddened, tear-stained face out of his hands. He looked gross, honestly. Dean didn’t care. He wasn’t doing the carefree thing, anymore. He was doing real life. The messy one, where people got ugly and had needs and got scars and got snot on their boyfriend’s shirt.

“I think I should go see my father,” Castiel croaked. “I should—I should talk to him, tell him I didn’t mean for this to happen. The firm is going to fall apart, and he’s going to be devastated, and it’s my fault.”

“Well, that’s your opinion,” Dean said. “It’s a really, really stupid one, though.”

Castiel scowled. “I know he’s going to hurt me. But so what? He’s still my father.”

“Here’s my counter offer: I think you’re real sad and tired and you need to talk about this in therapy tomorrow before you make a decision. I think that for now, you should come home and let me take care of you. You need a shower and a good night’s sleep, buckaroo.”

Castiel blinked at him, and his mouth trembled. “Home?”

Dean realized what he’d said only after Castiel repeated it. And he knew it was intense, too soon, and all that. But he didn’t really care. He’d already taken the guy back to Kansas and introduced him to his family, for god’s sake.

“Yeah, sweetheart. Let’s go home.”

“I don’t deserve you,” Castiel said.

“Well, that’s your opinion,” Dean said.

Chapter Text

Cas was taking a brief pause from dancing to hydrate. He was near the bar with a drink in his hand, plucking his sweaty shirt away from his body. He watched his friends dancing, holding his glass against his flushed cheek to cool off.

A woman sidled up next to him, a fresh drink in her hand and a coy smile on her lips. “Hi. I like your tattoos.”

It was instinct to briefly glance down at his own forearms when attention was drawn to them—he’d had his original Asclepius tattoo covered up by a larger piece of the same design, and had gotten the scales of justice with matching placement and size on the other arm. It had felt right, to have both.

“Thanks,” he said briefly, and tried to convey his lack of interest by grabbing his phone from his pocket and glancing at it. He saw now that he’d missed a text notification a few minutes ago, which wasn’t surprising, considering the loud, bass-heavy music blasting through the room.

He was so surprised by the name on his screen that he nearly dropped his orange juice.

“Excuse me,” he said to the woman, setting the glass down on the nearest surface and making straight for the exit.

Hester hadn’t texted him since Gabe’s first hearing last summer. His anxiety spiked immediately, and he shoved his way out of the club and outside, heart racing and fingers shaking as he fumbled for a cigarette. He lit up and took two hurried, needy drags before he leaned against the stone wall, letting the residual warmth it held from the day’s sun seep into his back, and finally started to calm down enough to actually look at the text message.

A mutual friend told me your good news. Congratulations, Asstiel.

The incredibly stupid nickname had seemed much more offensive when they were little kids. Seeing it now made him want to laugh, but his heart was in his throat and he didn’t know how he was feeling, exactly. He thought for a minute about not responding to the text at all. He was in a good place, and didn’t want to sabotage himself. On the other hand, maybe being in a good place was exactly why he could respond without ruining anything. And he wanted this so much. Just to be able to talk to her sometimes would already be enough.

He took another drag, released it long and slow, and started typing.

Thanks Pester. Does Dad know?

Do you really want to talk about Dad?

Ha ha no. 

You doing anything to celebrate?

Yeah out with friends right now 🪩🕺

… what kind of friends?

Don’t worry about me. 🙄

Well that’s encouraging.

“Castiel? What’s wrong?”

Cas looked up at the sound of his boyfriend’s worried tone. “Hey. I’m okay.”

Dean stepped in front of him and crowded in close, rubbing his hands over the goosebumps on Cas’s arms. It wasn’t really warm enough in February to go outside without a jacket, but Cas had barely noticed. “I don’t believe you. You were practically running to get out here to smoke, which means something’s wrong.”

“I don’t like how well you know me,” Cas said, smiling into Dean’s worried eyes.

“Yes, you do.”

“Okay, yeah. But I really am okay. Actually… I need to take a picture with you.”

Dean didn’t even hesitate, turning to nestle himself against Cas’s side and throwing an arm over his shoulder, beaming for their selfie like he was born for the cameras. Which… well. He was, a little.

“Oh, hey, we look awesome. Send me that, I’m putting it on my Instagram.”

Cas had finally given Dean permission to have photos of them together on social media, because he no longer really cared if his family saw them. He hadn’t actually expected Dean to want to, though, with the way his career was picking up steam while hype was building for his new movie.

Cas didn’t know what he’d expected, honestly. Maybe for Dean to pretend that he wasn’t dating anyone, or to do what he’d done in the past with staged flirtations with other actors. Instead, Dean was showing Cas off like he was some kind of trophy, always captioning photos of them together with stuff like “all this AND he’s smart as hell – everybody keep your fingers crossed for his NREMT exam coming up!!!” The weirder part was the dozens of little fingers-crossed emojis and heart emojis that would inevitably follow. The number of congratulations Dean had gotten to pass along to Cas today when Dean had announced to his followers that Cas was an officially certified EMT had freaked him out, a little. Dating a celebrity, even a minor celebrity, was weird.

Cas sent the photo to Dean without arguing, but he’d meant it for his sister, who definitely wasn’t following Dean’s Instagram. He sent it to Hester with the caption, my boyfriend is keeping an eye on me so you really don’t have to worry, Pester 😇👌

CAS IS THAT WHO I THINK IT IS

Cas put his phone away instead of answering, and turned to kiss Dean. “There. Everything’s good, I swear. I’ll tell you about it later, but for now I’m ready to get back in there and watch you shake your ass some more.”

“Hell, yeah,” Dean grinned, taking his hand and pulling him back toward the door of the club. “It’s your party, sweetheart, I’ll shake it all night if you want.”

Cas watched Dean walk with a critical eye. “I’m giving you thirty more minutes.”

“Come on, my leg’s fine.”

“It’s fine for thirty more minutes,” Cas said. Dean had a familiarly mulish look on, and Cas raised an eyebrow at him. “I’ll pick you up and carry you out of here if you won’t go yourself; don’t test me.”

Dean laughed, color high in his cheeks. “A reward doesn’t make a very good threat, Castiel,” he said in a deep voice, his eyes darkening. Cas shivered, which he wasn’t even going to pretend was about the cold February air. He just liked the way Dean said his name sometimes, drawing it out and stressing the “el” with a curl of his tongue at the end like he was licking it. He grabbed Dean by the waist and pulled him back into the ebb and flow of the undulating beast that was a crowd of people in a dance club. They slowly worked their way back to Jody, Donna, Charlie, and Meg.

Cas let go of anything resembling coherent thought as his boyfriend slid his arms around Cas’s neck and waited for Cas’s reciprocation. Dean pressed their hips together and started swaying, leaning back into Cas’s hold and closing his eyes and grinning, clearly just enjoying the music. Dean was so stunningly hot, and he seemed back to a level of comfort with his body where he knew it. Cas couldn’t decide if he was happier for himself and his recertification, or just to be able to see Dean like this. It felt like this night was a celebration of both, really.

True to his word, Cas made them quit for the night after about thirty more minutes. Dean pretended he was going to be difficult at first, saying “come over here and make me,” because of course he did. Cas did come close, as Dean had said, but only to put his mouth to Dean’s ear and whisper, “I need you to save some strength for when we get home, cowboy.” Dean went quite willingly after that.

“All right, ladies, try not to burn the place down while we’re gone, huh?” Dean joked, spinning his keys on his index finger.

Meg rolled her eyes from the sofa, where she was wrapped in a D&D-themed throw blanket with her bare calves and feet poking out. It was early, but she’d insisted on getting up long enough to say goodbye. “Please, the fire hazard is going with you.”

“I’m trying to quit,” Cas insisted with a cigarette already resting, unlit, between his lips. He was going to smoke one before they got in the car, and then he’d put on his nicotine patch and deal.

“Whatever you say, babe.”

Charlie, who was standing in the kitchen pouring herself a bowl of cereal, threw a pot holder at Meg’s head. “Be nice to him, he is trying.”

“Thank you, Charlie,” Cas said, pointing at her with his lighter. “I’m down to two packs a week, for your information, Margaret.”

“That’s not my name, Clarence. But congratulations, I guess.”

Dean pressed a brief kiss to the side of Cas’s head as his hand found the small of Cas’s back and started shoving him out the door. “You’re doing great, I’m proud, let’s get out of here before we waste anymore daylight.”

“Be safe!” Charlie shouted at them. “Love you!”

“I know!” Cas and Dean called back simultaneously, and high-fived each other as the door to the apartment closed behind them.

Cas could already feel himself starting to relax as they took the stairs down to the parking lot, weekend bags slung over their shoulders and a small cooler for drinks and snacks bumping against Cas’s thigh. It wasn’t that he minded the close living quarters the four of them had been in for the past few months, but privacy and quiet had been somewhat lacking. Once Cas had found a job on an ambulance crew, it would be time to start thinking about whether he and Dean wanted to look for a separate apartment.

That he and Dean would be moving together wasn’t even a question.

When Cas had quit the firm a few months ago, he’d only meant to stay in Dean and Charlie’s apartment for a week or two while his father cooled off, but somehow he’d never managed to leave. He’d finally given up his lease last month and cleared out his own apartment. Meg technically still had a room at the apartment she shared with two other roommates, but Cas was starting to think she might take over Dean’s lease if he wanted to move.

Or maybe they could all look for a larger place and stay together. Cas wasn’t sure how to bring up the idea, but he wanted to. It was nice, having family around.

Cas threw out his cigarette butt, then walked over to where Dean was waiting, leaning on Baby’s hood. He put his bag and the cooler into the backseat and got into the shotgun seat while Dean was sliding into the driver’s side.

“You ready to hit the road, sweetheart?” Dean grinned at him.

“More than.”

“Awesome. Pick out some music, then.”

Dean would drive until somewhere around the state border, then Cas would take over driving so Dean could start reading the book he’d picked out for their road trip. They’d get to Flagstaff in time for dinner, then tomorrow they were going to the Grand Canyon. They could only take three days, since Dean was still shooting And This,Your Living Kiss and had to be on set bright and early on Monday, but the trip was what Cas wanted as his ‘graduation’ gift, so they were making it work.

He scooted as far toward Dean as his seatbelt would allow, and reached into his jacket pocket to show Dean the handful of cassette tapes he was carrying.

“Did you make mixtapes?” Dean gasped joyfully, grabbing one of them with his left hand while his right arm was going behind Cas’s back and pulling him close.

Cas grinned, glad the surprise was well-received. They often listened to the collection Dean had inherited from his parents, but Cas had wanted to make something new for the trip.

“God, you have terrible handwriting. What did you title this mix? ‘Looking up?’” Dean looked up at Cas, who looked away with a feeling like his cheeks were going red against his will. “Cas, you sap.”

Cas shrugged. “They’re all songs about the sky.”

“Revision: you’re a huge sap. What songs?”

“Why don’t you put the tape on and find out?” Cas said, trying to wiggle out of Dean’s hold.

“Okay,” Dean laughed, gripping Cas harder and pulling him close to try to plant a kiss on him while he resisted. “Okay, fine, I’m sorry. Let’s put it on.”

Somewhat mollified, Cas stopped trying to get away, and put the tape in the deck while Dean was starting the engine.

The puttering growl reverberated in the floorboards under their feet, and Cas felt the last dregs of tension shaken out of him by the vibration. The first guitar riff of Journey’s “Wheel in the Sky” surged out of the speakers as Dean put Baby into gear, and they headed east, straight into the sunrise.